The Charity (Help the Hospices)
Last Updated (Thursday, 11 June 2009 09:05)
What we do in the UK
Hospice care changes lives. A quarter of a million patients are cared for by hospices in the UK each year, either in a hospice or in their own home.
Our vision is that everyone at the end of life has access to the best possible care. So we offer services to support hospice and palliative care professionals as they support their patients.
Hospice information service is a worldwide information resource for professionals and the public. Help the Hospices in partnership with St Christopher’s Hospice, provide a dedicated source of information about UK and international hospice and palliative care. The service offers information by telephone, in print and online.
We champion the cause of hospice care in Westminster, Whitehall and the media. We work to make sure that policy makers hear hospices’ views and concerns, and to influence national debates on end of life and palliative care. In addition, we coordinate national campaigns, connect supporters with local hospices and help hospices to raise the funds they need to keep running their services.
One of the founding visions of Help the Hospices was to support education and training. We offer a comprehensive range of education and training courses for professionals working in palliative care, which includes subjects as varied as health and safety and good governance. Our most recent projects are:
- Masters in Hospice Leadership, offered in partnership with Lancaster University Management School and the International Observatory on End of Life Care
- Postgraduate Certificate: Working with Bereaved Adults, offered in partnership with Sir Michael Sobell House and St Christopher's Hospice, and validated by Middlesex University.
We provide a range of grants for individuals and hospices. These grants can be for anything from helping towards paying for a professional qualification to funding for special projects to enlarge and develop hospice services. We also offer our support and expertise to help hospices manage projects and evaluate them.
Our quality and standards work helps formalise the sharing of good practice and ideas among hospices. We also produce a range of quality tools and support quality improvement processes in hospices
Our special projects help hospices to fund the development of new and innovative services. This has a direct impact on hospice care and how it is delivered in the UK.