Substance Abuse Counselor

SIGN ON BONUS$$$$$$$

MAIN PURPOSE OF POSITION:

Under general supervision, provides education and counseling on chemical dependency, co-occurring disorders and relapse prevention to patients and their families. Responsible for matching individuals with clinically indicated treatment deemed appropriate at the time of the initial assessment and ongoing assessments thereafter. Collaborates regarding treatment with community psychiatrist, therapist or official health care providers to provide a holistic treatment approach

2) DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

1. Customer Relations: Actively seeks to provide high quality services that meet the needs of patients, families, referral sources and third party payers.

2. Case Management, Triage and Referral:

· Provides pre admission screening, intake assessment, intervention services and post discharge follow up for patients seeking treatment at Better Path Mental Health Center Ensures that information, assessment and referral needs are met prior to termination of patient contact.

· Establishes and maintains regular contact with referring groups, individuals and agencies, both internal and external to Better Path Mental Health Center

· Makes clinical referral and provides triage to appropriate program resources.

3. Provision of Clinical Care

• Participates in treatment planning with other members of the treatment team.

• Serves as group leader/co-leader for education and therapy groups.

• Serves as primary therapist for patients and provides case management services from the time of admission through transfer/discharge.

4. Documentation/Reporting

• Completes written documentation of initial patient assessment and ongoing treatments and progress through discharge in compliance with the program standards. Reports pertinent observations to clinical director/treatment team.

• Collects referral data and generates reports for use in marketing assessments, quality assurance, program development, referral relations and health care utilization research.

5. Participation in Improving Program Effectiveness and Efficiency:

Participates in the evaluation of program effectiveness and efficiency and works to ensure continuous improvements in the quality of service.

4) REQUIRED KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND ABILITIES:

• Work requires knowledge of chemical dependency, psychiatric diagnoses and treatment, crisis intervention methods and counseling techniques - normally acquired through a Bachelor's degree in Psychology, Counseling, Social Work, or related areas.

• Work requires knowledge of community resources, orientation to chemically dependent/dual diagnosis patients, planning and organizations skills sufficient to resolve placement and liaison concerns -normally acquired through six months of work-related experience.

• Must have and maintain certification as a trainee, CSC-AD, CAC-AD or licensure above in the State of Maryland.

• Must possess interpersonal skills sufficient to communicate effectively when providing therapy and instruction and serve as liaison role with patients, families, staff and a wide variety of professionals which performing case management and triage functions (51% -80% of work time.)

• Must possess analytical skills sufficient to concentrate and pay close attention to detail when conducting assessment and therapy sessions, performing case management and triage, making treatment recommendations and providing crisis intervention services.

• Work requires standing and walking between group rooms and office location (for approximately 10% of work time.)

• Ability to apply techniques for effective public presentations and community education.

• Ability to establish and maintain effective therapeutic relationships with patients and their families.

• Ability to exercise good judgment inpatient evaluations and analyses of situations and problems.