Since we announced the suspension of admission to our hospice beds St Mary’s Hospice has been continuing to deliver a wide range of services to support our community. Our commitment to reopening our hospice inpatient beds has led to an international recruitment campaign seeking medical staff with the skills we need. Here’s the latest update on that recruitment process:
Val Stangoe, St Mary’s Chief Exec: “Patients who have complex symptoms or who need to be in a hospice at the end of life can often not be easily cared for by other local organisations. Delivering specialist palliative care needs doctors with very specific skills and experience and these doctors are increasingly hard to find. We are now at the point of setting dates for interviews for potential candidates towards the end of this month and we continue to feel cautiously optimistic about the reopening of the beds.”
While the Inpatient Unit has been temporarily suspended, the clinical team have been able to increase the amount of care they give in our community. By adding nursing hours from our inpatient staff to the St Mary’s Hospice at Home team we’ve been able to deliver even more care in the comfort of people’s homes, including additional night sitting and respite care. We’ve also delivered more Living Well activities at our Living Well Centre on Duke Street in Barrow.
Val Stangoe: “We’re grateful for the continued positive feedback from patients and families. We’re working hard to deliver integrated care alongside our fellow healthcare professionals so care is seamless for patients and their families. Your positive comments are a boost for staff and volunteers in a difficult situation and have supported them to continue to make those differences that matter most. ”