Specialist Staff Nurse
At a glance
- Band
- Band 7
- Contract
- Permanent
- Pattern
- Full-time
- Posted
- 17/09/2026
- Closes
- 24/09/2026
Sponsorship verdict
Sponsorship is not clearly stated in this advert.
The advert didn't contain a clear role-specific sponsorship line, so HiveMind can't confirm eligibility. Verify with the recruiting manager or trust HR before you apply.
Role summary
This is a Band 7 Specialist Staff Nurse role within Berkshire Healthcare's new Assertive Outreach service. The successful candidate will provide intensive, flexible, and compassionate support to individuals with severe and enduring mental health conditions. Working from either Reading or Slough, the role involves managing a caseload, delivering proactive outreach, and developing collaborative care plans to prevent crisis and admission. It's an opportunity to contribute to service development and provide clinical leadership within a multidisciplinary team.
Key responsibilities
- Manage a protected caseload of individuals with complex mental health needs, significant risk factors and multi-agency involvement.
- Deliver proactive and persistent outreach, including community visits and flexible engagement approaches.
- Develop collaborative care plans focused on recovery, relapse prevention and admission avoidance.
- Work closely with carers, families and partner agencies including housing, social care, primary care, police and voluntary services.
- Act as an expert practitioner within the multidisciplinary team, providing clinical leadership, supervision and specialist advice.
- Contribute to service development, quality improvement and the implementation of innovative approaches to engagement and care.
Essential criteria
- Registered Mental Health Nurse
- NMC Registration
- Mentorship Qualification or equivalent experience
- Demonstrable experience of working autonomously to deliver high quality and evidence-based nursing care.
- Experience in providing supervision to junior colleagues and students in the completion of routine nursing and clinical skills.
- Uphold the Trust's values of being caring, committed and working as team through demonstrable examples and experience.
- Ability to demonstrate highly specialist clinical nursing skills relevant to the role.
- Demonstrable ability to effectively identify risks or deviations from normal and escalate concerns in a timely way.
- Ability to prioritise workload to meet conflicting demands, where there may be a variety of conflicting pressures.
- Advanced use of digital tools and applications including Word, Outlook and patient management systems.
- Ability to maintain written records which are tailored for the situation, such as patient notes, patient reports or presentations.
- Ability to travel between multiple Trust sites and non-Trust locations, including patient homes, some of which may be challenging to access via public transport.
Desirable criteria
- Highly specialist knowledge acquired through education to Masters level, training or equivalent experience, in your relevant specialty
- Evidence of highly developed continuous professional development relevant to your area of specialism
Useful to know
Agenda for Change 2024/25 pays Band 7 at £46,148 – £52,809 a year, across England.
This advert: £49,387 – £56,515 — outside the standard scale; check for HCAS/London weighting.
Posted 1d ago · Closes in 7d
Plenty of time to prepare a strong application.
Full advert · preview
Berkshire Healthcare Foundation Trust
Specialist Staff Nurse
The closing date is 24 September 2026
Job summary
Berkshire Healthcare is developing an innovative Assertive Outreach service to provide intensive, flexible and compassionate support to people living with severe and enduring mental health conditions who find it difficult to engage with traditional services. To support this, we are looking for a Specialist Staff Nurse.
This is an exciting Band 7 opportunity to join a newly established specialist multidisciplinary team and play a key role in leading and shaping how Assertive Outreach is delivered across Berkshire. Working from either our Reading or Slough hub, you will support individuals with complex needs, helping them remain engaged with services, avoid crisis and admission, and achieve the outcomes that matter most to them.
Location: Prospect House, Reading OR New Horizons, Slough
We have two full time posts available
Main duties of the job
As a Specialist Staff Nurse, you will:
- Manage a protected caseload of individuals with complex mental health needs, significant risk factors and multi-agency involvement.
- Deliver proactive and persistent outreach, including community visits and flexible engagement approaches.
- Develop collaborative care plans focused on recovery, relapse prevention and admission avoidance.
- Work closely with carers
Join the community to read the full pack, responsibilities and person-specification in one place.
Your seat is reserved — activate it
CareerHive is included with your CareerHive Skool community membership. If you haven't claimed your account yet, join the community (or sign in with the same email you joined with) to unlock the full advert, the apply link, HiveMind AI interview & application suite, your private vault, and daily sponsorship alerts.