The difference your support makes

 The Peony room at Worcestershire Royal Hospital is a dedicated relatives’ room where the families and loved-ones of patients who are nearing the end of their lives can take a break from the ward environment. 

The Charity, with your support, has helped to furnish the room and provide the all-important refreshments for relatives and loved-ones.    

On the opening of the Peony room, Avril Adams, Lead Nurse Specialist Palliative and End of Life Care team said: 

“We are delighted to be able to introduce the new Peony room for the relatives of some of our seriously ill patients. Death and dying is very difficult to deal with, but helping patients and those people important to them at their time of greatest need is hugely important to us. Providing these new facilities demonstrates our dedication to supporting our patients and the people most important to them at one of the most distressing of times. Our patients often worry about how their loved ones are coping even when they are receiving treatment, the new facilities will help bring great comfort to our patients that we are providing holistic care for people most important to them too.”   

Sophie Burt, Head of Fundraising and Community Development for Worcestershire Acute Hospitals Charity added:

 “Our charity is committed to providing those added extras that improve the experience for everyone using or providing services. We are thrilled that we are able to support such a fantastic project, which not only focuses on putting patients first but also helps to improve the experience of the people most important to them. We would like to thank all of our supporters for their donations, of both money and items, for a project that makes a real difference to our patients.”    

There are already plans underway to transform space at the Alexandra Hospital, Redditch to offer the same support as the Peony room. 

Our Charity mission is supporting patients, staff and services of Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust. Following the on-going pressures faced by the Trust a focus of the charity has been to support staff development and welfare.  

The on-going pressure of COVID-19 on the NHS system, the subsequent waves and the practicalities surrounding this means that staff wellbeing will continue to be a key issue for the Trust and the NHS as a whole with both short and long term mental and physical wellbeing. 

As a Charity we are supporting staff welfare by training Mental Health First Aiders to better support all staff.  Using a grant from The Edward Cadbury Trust our Charity funded training of Mental Health First Aiders. Our Trust identified that staff needed training in the skills required to recognise and signpost staff when they identify mental health concerns. Mental Health First Aiders are now on hand to support staff and patients with their mental health journeys. The online training sessions where led by The Kaleidoscope + Group. Kaleidoscope + Group are committed to delivering high quality, evidence-based training to help break the stigma and discrimination associated with mental health. 

The sessions were designed to help staff to better understand mental ill health and to enable the identification of techniques, strategies and next steps which can help staff to support themselves and others. 

This fulfilled our aim for the session which was for staff to report that they feel more able to assist a person in distress, provide initial support and feel confident to challenge stigma surrounding mental health.  

We are pleased to say that we have 16 trained Mental Health First Aiders. The interactive sessions have had very positive feedback from our newly qualified Trainers. 

"The training really made me think about and challenge my own perceptions around mental health and how the language we use is so important in changing the narrative. I would definitely recommend training for everyone."

Following the initiation of the Mental Health First Aiders in our hospital community staff have requested more training sessions; we will be looking to hold three further sessions this year to further support staff development and wellbeing.

As a Charity we have worked with the Outpatients Physiotherapy Department at Worcestershire Royal Hospital to provide additional equipment to further support their patient’s rehabilitation and continue to put patients first.   

The Outpatients Physiotherapy Department identified that a large proportion of patients require resistance training in order to complete their rehabilitation programme. However, the Department was not able to provide the required weight loads for the adaptations of exercises to best support their patients.  

Patients where therefore having to practise the required exercises at the Hospital using lower weight loads with their Physiotherapist before going solo to their personal gym to carry out the exercises with heavier weight loads.  

The Charity has therefore funded the additional equipment needed to ensure that all rehabilitation exercise can now be carried out at the Hospital under the supervision of their Physiotherapist using the most effective weight load for their treatment.  

Michael Mundy, Physiotherapist at Worcestershire Royal Hospital, said of the project: 

“The equipment provided by the Worcestershire Acute Hospitals Charity has been completely transformative in regards to the quality of rehabilitation we can provide to patients within the outpatient’s physiotherapy department at Worcester. A large proportion of our patients require resistance training to help treat their pain, improve their function or as part of their return to sport process. To work on strength specifically, it is imperative that patients have access to loads that are heavy enough to elicit the required adaptations to the target muscle group or movement. Historically, within the physiotherapy department we have only had very low load equipment which does not provide adequate resistance to achieve these goals. As such, we have previously had to practice exercises with low loads and advise patients to increase the loads themselves in the gym without being able to actually assess the patient with the target load. We are all very grateful to the Worcestershire Acute Hospitals Charity for providing this equipment which has resolved this issue completely.”  

We were pleased to be able to support the End of Life Care Team with the development of Bereavement Bags.    

As part of our Palliative Care Teams work they identified that when a patient passes away the way their personal effects are returned to their loved ones could be improved upon.   

We worked with the Team to fund Bereavement Bags, a discreet bag which can be packaged for loved ones with both the patient’s belongings as well as providing them with materials and advice to aid the processing of their loss.   

The bags are now in use across our Hospitals, if you would like to find out more about the SUPPORT fund and the work our Palliative Care Teams do you can read more here.