A clinic in the heart of South Leeds is supporting people with life-limiting illnesses closer to their own home. Wheatfields Hospice, one of seven hospices run by health and social care charity Sue Ryder, opened an outreach service last July after securing premises thanks to the support of a local care home, Sunnyview House.
A clinic in the heart of South Leeds is supporting people with life-limiting illnesses closer to their own home. Wheatfields Hospice, one of seven hospices run by health and social care charity Sue Ryder, opened an outreach service last July after securing premises thanks to the support of a local care home, Sunnyview House.
The centre, which is opened every Friday from 10am until 2pm, provides a range of specialist palliative care services including appointments with medical and nursing staff, complimentary therapies and a drop-in facility for patients and carers for support, advice and signposting to other services when necessary.
Julie Marshall-Pallister, Community Palliative Care Team Leader at Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice, said: “We are very grateful to Sunnyview House for making it possible for us to support people in the South of Leeds. The main objective of the service is to reach out to as many people as possible living with life-limiting conditions including cancer, heart failure and renal failure and to improve access to care services for people living in the South of Leeds.
We are delighted to be able to provide a specialist palliative day service to residents living in South Leeds allowing them choices in where they receive their care. In the long term we are hoping to be able to replicate this model in other parts of Leeds to facilitate access to palliative and end of life care services”.
Harjinder Singh, one of the patients attending the clinic, commented: “Having a service in the South of Leeds has made a huge difference to me. The service is much more convenient and nearer to my home. The building is beautiful and doesn’t feel like a nursing home. All of the staff are very courteous and polite. I have appointments to see the doctor, but I also access complimentary therapy. And I can discuss issues with the nursing staff, all in one visit”.
Jacqueline Foxton, manager of Sunnyview House said: “We are pleased to be able to help people in our local community, as well as our residents and their families, access Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice’s services and to be able to work with and learn from the hospice team. Our staff have significant experience and training is very important to us as it is key to providing the highest quality of person-centred care.”
The clinic has helped further develop integrated work with other local healthcare professionals including district nurses, primary care, statutory services and volunteering agencies. Consultants in Palliative Medicine and Community Clinical Nurse Specialists at Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice deliver educational programmes on management of palliative care issues and end of life care to care home staff and other local healthcare professionals.
The day therapy unit team and community nurse team at Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice have been recently shortlisted for the prestigious International Journal of Palliative Nursing Award in the category ‘Multidisciplinary team work’ after presenting evidence of the work undertaken at the clinic. The aim of the multidisciplinary teamwork award is 'to highlight inspirational multidisciplinary work’ looking at how groups of people have worked together to make a difference to the care of patients and those close to them.
The official ceremony took place on Friday 29 March and the team at Sue Ryder Wheatfields Hospice was awarded a fantastic third place in their nominated category amongst more than 100 applications from all over the world. Julie Marshall-Pallister added: “This is a fantastic achievement and a recognition of the ongoing commitment of everyone at Sue Ryder to work together alongside other healthcare professionals to provide the best high quality care to people and their family at a very vulnerable time of their life”.
Sue Ryder is evolving its care offering in line with what people want and changes in health and social care funding. Public sector funding will reduce in the future and the need to support people living with multiple and complex care needs closer to home will increase. The charity is responding to this by expanding its community services to reach more people and adapting services to respond to people’s personal care needs.