Where compassion meets innovation and technology and our employees are family.

General Purpose of Job

Driscoll Children’s Hospital aims to create a thoughtful, impactful preventative and treatment program to help care givers and children struggling behaviorally, or emotionally to provide them with the tools, resources, and coping skills to help them work through challenging times. The hospital based Mental health specialist will provide a wide variety of services to include individual, family, collateral and group counseling, diagnostic evaluation, health and behavioral assessments, safety planning, crisis intervention, and referral to community resources as they address the impact of illness through mental health support and treatment. Driscoll Children’s Hospital aims to provide population-level intervention to prevent child abuse and treat mental illness. This role will serve to provide training mental health specialists to better assist children and adolescents dealing with two most common issues—anxiety and depression as well support caregivers/parents with caring for chronically ill children.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities           

• To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily.

• The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required.  Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

• Always maintains utmost level of confidentiality.

• Adheres to policies and procedures.

• Demonstrates business practices and personal actions that are ethical and adhere to corporate compliance and integrity guidelines. 

• Follows The Driscoll Way customer service standards set forth by the DHS. 

• Maintains annual education requirements (Cornerstone).

• Maintains and follows Code of Conduct and Standards of practice set forth by Texas Licensure Boards. 

• Responsible for professional supervision and continuing education to maintain state licensure.

• Attends and participates in staff meetings.

• Participates in the training (precepting) of new employees, supervision of social work students, and cross training of co-workers.

• Provides mentorship and peer support.

• Participates in annual performance improvement activities and the periodic review and revision of policy and procedures.

• Conducts process and debriefing support opportunities for staff concerning such issues as grief, conflict, and interaction with families.

• Provides screening, assessment, evaluation, therapeutic intervention, treatment planning, education, safety planning, and coordination of behavioral health services in the school setting.  

• Provides mediation and crisis intervention services for patients and families

• Provides programming for the provision of individual, group, and family support / therapy with the goal of reducing maladaptive behavior and fostering effective psychological functioning.  

• Provision of therapeutic interventions and treatment strategies to include, but not limited to, motivational interviewing, treatment engagement, crisis intervention and intensive crisis stabilization, brief and solution focused therapy, and safety planning.

• Plans and facilitates support groups for patients, parents, and families

• Engages in shared decision making and treatment planning.

• Upon suspicion/confirmation of abuse, neglect, or exploitation of a child, elderly, or disabled person…

• Notifies appropriate agency (Texas Department of Protective and Regulatory Services and/or Law Enforcement agency).

• Serves as a liaison and advocate with community programs and agencies related to health, mental health, and community supports.  

• Provides presentations and in-services to school personnel, students, and the community as requested.

• Works with staff from outside agencies to ensure quality care along the continuum.

• Testifies in court regarding child abuse and/or neglect.

Education / Experience

• Master’s Degree Social Work or Master’s Degree Counseling

• Two years’ experience in working in mental health / behavioral health field 

• Experience in diagnosing mental health and substance use disorders

• Experience providing individual, group, and family counseling

Certificates, Licenses, Registrations

• Licensure by the Texas State Board of Social Worker Examiners LCSW or LCSW-S, LMSW under supervision

(or)

• Licensure by the Texas State Board of Professional Counselling , LPC or LPC-A