‘Hospice at Night’ Receives Vital Funding To Extend Service

Bury Hospice’s night sitting service ‘Hospice at Night’ has received vital funding to extend for a further six months.

The specialist service provides palliative and end-of-life care to adult patients in their homes, offering respite to carers and personalised support to patients.

Hospice at Night sees Bury Hospice support workers, Joanne Barber and Linda McGookin, cover night sits for patients across Bury on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

The vital service initially started off as a twelve month pilot in 2023, however, this recent funding means night sitting will be extended for an additional six months, ensuring the delivery of much-needed care in our communities.

Jackie Halstead, Patient Services Development Lead at Bury Hospice, said: “Hospice at Night enables carers to get a good night's sleep, because often when somebody's in the dying stages or deteriorating, the early hours can be the worst time.”

“The vast majority of care is delivered by carers, most often, over 24-hours a day; our night sitting service means carers can get a good rest and not feel absolutely exhausted. It enables them to still care during the day, and gives them some quality of life.”

Linda echoes this sentiment, she said: “Families can rest assured because we treat your family as our own, while you get much needed rest. Your loved one is in our knowledgeable, safe, and compassionate hands.”

Joanne and Linda are very passionate about the night sits, and they go the extra mile to provide relief and emotional support.

Joanne said: “This valuable service is very much needed in Bury. The feedback we regularly receive from families is that they can handover care of their loved one to us, and rest easy with confidence that their relative is receiving quality care in their own home, giving them a choice.”

Bury Hospice wants to keep the night sitting service going indefinitely, and long-term permanent clinical funding is currently being sought to ensure this.

Bury Hospice has ambitions for Hospice at Night to expand by including services such as an on-call phone line to support patients in crisis.

There is currently a rolling waiting list than can offer a supportive night sit for up to six patients a week, depending on the present need.

Jackie said: “Right now, we can unfortunately, only see a small amount of patients, but we know the need in Bury is most probably massive.”

To find out more about our community support services, please visit: https://www.buryhospice.org.uk/community-support