Feature: 25 years of care at St Clare Hospice

Since registering as a charity in 1990, St Clare Hospice in Hastingwood has grown rapidly, giving free care to around 10,000 people with life limiting and terminal illnesses over the years.

Every year, more than 1,400 people from west Essex and east Hertfordshire receive care from the St Clare team and demand is constantly increasing.

The number of people aged 85 and over in the United Kingdom is expected to double by 2035, with the number of people over 100-years-old expected to increase more than eightfold.

As well as meeting the expanding demand, the team at St Clare is also fighting to dispel myths about hospice care – it is not just ‘a place to die’.

Retired carpenter Roger Thorlby, 57, lives in Loughton and started attending day therapy and breathlessness groups at St Clare in 2014.

The father of four, who has heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, said: “I’d only heard of the hospice as a ‘doom and gloom’ place - somewhere you go to die.

“That seems to be everyone’s impression and I had no idea they did therapy for people like me.”

He added: “When you’re stuck at home, sitting and staring at four walls, it makes you miserable, but you come here and you see someone smile and it makes you smile too.

“At the beginning of last year, I had months where I just couldn’t breathe and it went on and on and on and that really, really gets you down.

“What I’ve learnt here about what to do has really helped me cope and I just wish I’d known about St Clare Hospice back then.”

One of St Clare’s newest projects is the Hospice at Home team, which started in 2014 and recently expanded to provide 24-hour care.

Community manager Sarah Godfrey said: “They go out to people at the end of life or at a time of crisis.

“There might be patients who have got a palliative diagnosis and they decide they want to be at home, their condition had deteriorated.

“More people want to stay at home and be with their loved ones, where they can see friends and family.”

She added: “Managing to help that person stay at home where they want to be, that in itself is very rewarding.

“At the end of the day we are here to support the patients in their direction.

“If they change their mind, we do everything we can to meet that.”

It is this dedication to patients’ needs that has seen hospice staff tackle tasks including, among others, bringing a beloved pet donkey to the inpatient unit for one last chance to meet its owner.

It is about providing what patients want wherever possible, said inpatient unit manager Vanna Poulter.

“We had a lady expecting her first grandchild, she did not want to die before the grandchild was born.

“It was obvious she was not going to make it.

“One of my staff took it on herself to call a 4D scanning company, they took the mother in.

“Unfortunately the grandmother died, but they put the scan of her grandchild in her coffin.

“That will stay with her forever.”

With only limited funding from the NHS, the work by St Clare staff relies on charity shops and a network of 550 volunteers in more than 20 different roles.

One such volunteer is June Merralls, who works at the St Clare shop in Loughton after her sister Brenda received care from the hospice.

“We never thought her cancer would spread so rapidly, we knew we would not be able to care for her at home,” she said.

“They were our safety net when we were falling.

“When we came in, I was able to be her sister again.

“We could laugh, we put her make-up on… she was relaxed and was not in that excruciating pain all the time.”

After returning home for a short while, Brenda went back to the hospice for end-of-life care.

“She felt safe and cared for.

“We had no fears about her coming back, we knew that it was the right place for her to be.”

As well as volunteering at the shop, June is now working as part of a forum which feeds back advice on new initiatives at St Clare and she hopes to eventually volunteer at the hospice itself.

“I have had bereavement counselling from the hospice and it is like as much as I am helping them, they are helping me.

“It is like a package - it is not just about the care for Brenda, it is about the care after.”

She added: “You could not pay them enough, the treatment that they give you.”

The level of dedication from the treatment in an emotional and changing environment can be hard, but “incredibly rewarding,” said chief executive since 2011, Tanya Curry.

“You do sometimes get the odd day when you think everything is against you but when I see the difference our work can make, there is no better driver for what you are doing.

“When you go from a vision and a concept, to see that in reality and you have got a team delivering it, that is incredibly satisfying.”

With sights at the hospice now firmly set on the next 25 years, Tanya is working on the next concepts to meet the challenges ahead.

“There is a huge amount more that we still need to do.

“We need to think about how we work with all of our partners to create integrated care for the patients and their families.

“We know there are a lot of people out there who would potentially benefit from the expertise of our services, whether directly or in an educational capacity.

“We need to think about how we are going to meet more people’s needs and help more people die in the place of their choice.”

This will include a new child bereavement service, offering one-to-one support and group sessions where children can meet and play with others going through the same experiences.

The coming years will also see St Clare expand its day therapy and community services.

The plan, Tanya said, is to centralise all end-of-life care by working even more closely with the NHS and other providers in the area.

She said: “It is about making sure any patient and family requiring end of life care has the right care, delivered by the right people, at the right time.

“I want them to have a central point, a protective part of the community.”

By becoming even more central to the community, it is hoped that St Clare can continue providing the “safety net” so treasured by June, for as many people as possible.