Sponsor a Nurse this Christmas at Heart of Kent Hospice

Categories: Fundraising.

This festive season why not make a donation to Heart of Kent Hospice Sponsor a Nurse campaign and make a real difference to local lives affected by terminal illness. Heart of Kent Hospice relies almost entirely on donations and fundraising to provide exceptional specialist care for people living with a terminal illness whilst also supporting their families.

By supporting the ‘Sponsor a Nurse’ campaign with a one-off donation or monthly gift, you can help the Hospice to continue providing specialist nursing care to people with a terminal illness and their families who are living in Maidstone, Aylesford, Tonbridge & Malling and surrounding areas.

Heart of Kent Hospice is currently caring for over 1,081 patients (case load) either at home, in the Hospice Inpatient Unit or through the Hub drop-in sessions which provide support for patients and their families who are facing life limiting illnesses such as dementia and Motor Neuron Disease.

Laura Taylor, one of the amazing clinical Nurse Specialists in the Community Services team at Heart of Kent Hospice wanted to share one of her recent experiences:

“This year I supported a couple as their lives changed for ever. They made a big impression on me, and I hope you will be touched by their story, too.

“Sue had recently been diagnosed with terminal oesophagus cancer. She and her husband Mike had been together for 65 years. They’d known each other since junior school – Mike was the little boy who would pull Sue’s pigtails! He could not imagine life without his best friend. Sue was having palliative chemotherapy which was helping to stabilise the cancer. But it made her feel nauseous and chronically fatigued. She felt rough. All the time.

“Sue plucked up the courage to come to the Hospice Hub where I first met her. She asked for help with just one thing: Sue wanted to make the most of the precious time she had left – to capture a few more joyful moments with her husband and to enjoy eating again.

She wanted to stop the chemotherapy. But Mike wasn’t on the same page as Sue. He couldn’t bear the thought of life without her. He begged me to persuade her to continue the treatment, and you can imagine how painful this was for them both.

I made a promise to Sue and Mike. I promised that I would do the best I could to make Sue feel as well as possible for as long as possible. And I promised to support them both throughout that time. The chemotherapy stopped and I arranged for medication which gave Sue more energy and improved her appetite.

They went on a little cruise to Guernsey and sent photos of themselves enjoying sunshine and fine dining. Later, as Sue approached the end of her life, I made sure everything was in place so she would be comfortable at home. Sue died quietly one Sunday, with Mike beside her.

“Mike has struggled so much, but he said he will always be grateful that I helped him to make memories with Sue that he will cherish for ever. You can guess how relieved I felt to hear that.

“When there isn’t much time left to live, every moment counts. 

Please choose to help sponsor a Heart of Kent Hospice nurse because you are the reason we can care.”

To find out more about sponsoring a nurse and helping the Hospice to make those special moments as good as they can possibly be visit www.hokh.org/sponsoranurse

To find out how to refer a patient to their care visit www.hokh.org

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www.hokh.org

Heart of Kent Hospice has been providing free, compassionate, end-of-life care to people living with a terminal illness and their loved ones in Maidstone, Aylesford, Tonbridge and Malling and the surrounding towns and villages for the past 33 years.

The Hospice has built an excellent reputation within the local community for the quality of its care, which has been further endorsed by the Care Quality Commission who awarded us with an overall rating of ‘Outstanding’ following an inspection in February 2017.

Our vision is for everyone living with a terminal illness in our community to achieve the best quality of life. We are committed to achieving this by enabling them to live in comfort, with independence and dignity to the end of their lives, and to support those closest to them.

Last year the Hospice cared for over 2,000 patients and their families in their own homes or at our Aylesford-based Hospice. Our charity needs to raise £6.6 million to deliver all the Hospices services, and we depend heavily on our loyal community of supporters, whose generous donations and fundraising activities raise money for us every year.

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