Dr Jessica Griffith

Bio
 

• Dr Jessica Griffith is a registered psychologist with dual endorsement in Clinical and Forensic Psychology. She has completed a Bachelor of Psychological Science with honours, a Graduate Certificate in Forensic Mental Health and a Doctorate in clinical and forensic psychology (DR-CFPSY). She is a member of the APS, a Fellow of the Clinical College and Forensic Colleges, a member of ANZAPPL and founding President of the Australasian Association of Forensic Disabily (AAFDI). Dr Griffith also has certifications in Provent (Occupational and Train the Trainer – Managing Aggression in the Workplace), a Diploma of Management in Child, Youth and Family Services, a Diploma of Community Services Auditing, and is certified in Root Cause Analysis, and multiple current risk assessments. She is also a certified trainer for the ‘Signposts for Building Better Behaviour’ program for positive parenting group facilitation.

• Dr Griffith’s experience includes several leadership roles, during which she worked to address systemic gaps and improve clinical and social outcomes for service users. For example, as Coordinator with St Luke’s Anglicare in regional Victoria, she developed a quality system to foster accountability and continuous improvement internally and founded a network of providers to improve systemic issues in residential out of home care. As Team Leader of Quality at Bendigo Health, Dr Griffith led a team of consultants covering Psychiatric, Community and Continuing Care, Medical, Surgical, Maternity, and Corporate Services, and founded the first Morbidity and Mortality Reviews at the organisation. At Golden City Support Services, a non-government disability provider, Dr Griffith acted as an Operations Manager leading 7 teams of disability support workers providing care to complex clients with intellectual disabilities and mental illness. 

• Most recently, she worked as a senior psychologist at boutique provider, Complex Psychology providing supervision to internal and external practitioners and positive behaviour support to clients with challenging behaviour. She is a registered behaviour support practitioner (specialist, forensic and dual disability).

• She has provided training in modified DBT to forensic statewide services, and to staff at the Department of Justice and Community Safety as well as private organisations providing support to complex clients.

• She has extensive clinical experience in assessment and treatment of individuals who exhibit self-harm, aggression, violent and sexual offending, stalking, animal cruelty, substance misuse and fire setting. Her experience includes working with complex clients within government forensic disability services (e.g., DFATS; DFFH), secure forensic psychiatric services (e.g., Thomas Embling Hospital; Forensicare), government community disability services (e.g., BIST), a non-government dual disability service (Golden City Support Services) and in private practice. Dr Griffith has extensive experience in working with clients presenting with a range of complex difficulties including intellectual and developmental disabilities, autism, acquired brain injury, genetic disorders, serious mental illness and personality disorders, or aquired personality injury. She has facilitated several CBT and DBT based groups in secure services and within the community, including groups for intellectually disabled offenders. At Thomas Embling Hospital, Dr Griffith co-facilitated long-term group programs for offenders with a mental illness preparing to transition into the community. At the Intensive Residential Treatment Program (Forensic Residential Services) she co-facilitated offence related emotional regulation groups and offence specific violent offending groups and conducted in-depth client assessments for treatment readiness and appropriateness for the Forensic Disability program. 

• She has training and experience in risk assessment utilising a range of evidence-based tools (e.g., ARMIDILO-S and G, DASA and eDASA, BVC, HCR-20, SVR-20, VRAG, SESAS, SRP, PCL-R), and an understanding of the modified interpretation of mainstream tools when assessing cognitively impaired individuals. She has published peer reviewed articles on current risk assessment methodology, management of aggression and on treatments for sexualised behaviours and offending in individuals with a cognitive disability. She has presented her research at both national and international conferences, and worked on several literature reviews and research projects with the Department of Justice and Community Safety, Forensicare and the Centre for Forensic Behavioural Science. Her doctoral research focused on detection and management of imminent aggression in secure mental health facilities in collaboration with the Centre for Forensic Behavioural Science and Swinburne University. This work won the Clinical Excellence and Patient Safety category at the ACHS Quality Improvement Award.

• Dr Griffith’s approach is strengths-based and trauma-informed yet grounded in the reality of systemic and intrapersonal constraints. Most recently, she has begun work on development of several tools to assist with the understanding of behaviour and continuous improvement of service provision. She is committed to the provision of a high standard of care including a humanistic approach which honours clients’ autonomy, dignity, diversity, confidentiality, inclusion and human rights, and to fostering continuous improvement in programs and clinical interventions for vulnerable populations.