The Pride of Australia Medal recognises and rewards the country’s most outstanding members. Over the past ten years more than 550 medals have been awarded by News Corp Australia to everyday heroes across the community.
This year’s nominations include Narelle Martin, nursing manager at Bear Cottage a children’s hospice in Sydney, Australia. Bear Cottage hit international news headlines earlier this year when their royal highnesses, the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall, paid a visit to the hospice during their trip to New Zealand and Australia.
Earlier this month the Sydney Daily Telegraph reported that Bear Cottage’s nursing unit manager, Narelle Martin, had been nominated for this prestigious award due to her determination to make the sick children who visit the hospice feel happy and at peace. Narelle has been at Bear Cottage, situated in Manly, since its doors opened 13 years ago and has been instrumental in starting many innovative programmes to improve the lives of the children and their families, including mum’s well-being boot camps, sibling grief support and family camps, in fact “anything to make the families’ journey a little bit easier.”
The report goes on to say that Ms Martin was nominated for The Daily Telegraph’s Pride of Australia Care and Compassion Medal for improving the lives of those around her. Narelle says that she simply thought of her own family when developing programmes for her Bear Cottage family.
Approached by ehospice for comment, attributing praise to all those who work alongside her, Narelle told us, “I feel that my nomination is representative of the entire team at Bear Cottage and the passion and dedication of everyone here. Over the 13 years I have been at Bear Cottage my life has been enriched by the children and families that I have had the privilege of meeting and caring for.”
She says that for her, “working in a paediatric hospice is not just a job, it is a vocation and I feel very fortunate that facilities like Bear Cottage exist, making such a difference to the lives of the children with life limiting conditions and their families.”
Read the full report here
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