Tl - Abortion & Contraception Service

Location: Melbourne | Northern Metropolitan

Job type: Not provided

Organisation: The Royal Women's Hospital

**Salary**: Salary not specified

Occupation: Health and Allied Health

Reference: 25118

**Full Time Ongoing Role**

**Team Leader Abortion and Contraception Counsellor/ Social Worker**

**SC31 Grade 3 Year 1- SC34 Grade 3 Year 4**

**Organisational Context**

The Women's Social Model of Health Division is a newly formed function that reinforces our commitment to the social determinants of health. Whilst all services at the Women's ensure health equity for all women and patients, the Social Model of Health Division brings together our services and programs that specialise in providing care to women and patients facing challenges that may adversely affect their health. The Social Model of Health Division at the Women's has responsibility for ensuring the hospital's clinical and social support services are coordinated, aligned and leveraged to provide wrap around care for the women and patients who need it most. In particular, the division has a focus on ensuring a woman's social, economic, cultural, environmental, geographic, and other factors are taken into account in her care plan with the overall aim of reducing health inequalities and addressing systemic inadequacies that affect health access and outcomes.

**Department/Unit Specific Overview**

The Royal Women's Hospital provides abortion as part of its public health responsibility to provide safe health care to Victorian people. The Abortion and Contraception team is part of the Social Work Department and provides an intake service for pregnant people who are seeking an abortion. The social workers provide telephone and face-to-face pregnancy decision-making support, pregnancy options counselling, advocacy, information and referral to appropriate community services for these patients who have complex needs and social situations.

**Position Purpose**

The Team leader has a clinical leadership role in ensuring excellence in patient care, education and support of staff and students, and fostering staff development through the provision of supervision and other professional development opportunities. The Team leader is responsible for ensuring the maintenance of high-quality direct service work by the social workers. The team leader will undertake direct clinical practice to people who are seeking abortion and contraception.

**Your duties will include (but are not limited to) the following**:

- Provide a high quality evidence-based Social Work service at the Women's including psychosocial assessment, crisis intervention, short-term options and post termination counselling, bereavement care, advocacy, community liaison, referral and discharge planning
- Possess a high level theoretical understanding and an intersectional approach to your clinical practice in relation to working with victim/survivors of family violence and sexual assault and knowledge of working with complex trauma
- Undertake direct clinical practice including participation in the intake service and provision of short-term options and post termination counselling
- Provide the team of social workers with the opportunity to debrief after complex or distressing intakes and interventions including counselling sessions
- Work closely with the multi-disciplinary team involved in the care of patients and their families
- Involve patients/carers in the decision making of treatment goals and discharge
- Participate in the Social Work on call roster on weekends and public holidays
- Work closely with the multidisciplinary team and community support services [e.g. SafeSteps, CASA and family support services] involved in the care of patients and their families
- Ensure prompt intake and assessment of self-referred and newly referred patients
- Supervision of grade 1 and 2 staff as well as social work students

**To be successful within this role you will need to have**:

- Eligibility for membership of the Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW)
- Knowledge and skills necessary to provide clinical services to women and pregnant people attending the Women's for abortion services
- Knowledge of the psychosocial issues arising for people experiencing pregnancy and how this impacts their physical, social and emotional health
- Demonstrated knowledge in psychosocial assessment for women and pregnant people seeking to end a pregnancy, pregnancy decision making support, pregnancy options counselling, crisis counselling, post abortion counselling services bereavement care, advocacy, community liaison, referral and discharge
- Experience working with people who are experiencing family violence and reproductive coercion including use of the relevant legislation and practice frameworks relating to family violence practice, including but not limited to the Family Violence Information Sharing Scheme (FVISS), Child Information Sharing Scheme (CISS) and the Family Violence Multi-