Through a collaborative approach for professionals, St Christopher’s Centre for Awareness and Response to End of Life (CARE) is supporting those working in other hospices to push forward with a rehabilitative approach.
When physiotherapists Rachel Medland and Charlotte Muquit started work together at St Luke’s Hospice in Plymouth just over a year ago, neither had imagined quite the impact they would have on both patients and colleagues.
They attribute much of this success to their time spent engaged with St Christopher’s CARE’s Rehabilitative Palliative Care community of practice.
Neither had ever been a part of a year-long programme like this that saw them meet online for 90 minutes every month on their day off, with like-minded professionals. Thirteen months on, with a now well-established Pilates class and plans for a whole wellbeing morning, the pair say it was the community of practice that empowered them to introduce these initiatives.
For Charlotte in particular, for whom this was her first role in palliative care, the regular sessions provided her with the reassurance that she was doing the right thing and a vital sense of connection, given their slight sense of dislocation in Plymouth.
“From the very start they created a real community feel, like we were all in this together,” she says.
“We started by benchmarking where our hospices were at in terms of a rehabilitative approach and looked at goals, so we all knew where we were heading. I didn’t know anything about palliative care, but Gail Preston [Physiotherapist at St Christopher’s and a CARE lecturer) who ran the group was brilliant at validating us.”
Rachel had attended a two-day course at St Christopher’s a few years earlier, during her first spell working for St Luke’s. “That course was brilliant,” Rachel adds. “I went back feeling inspired, but then I lost momentum. So, when I started back at St Luke’s I looked at the St Christopher’s website because I’ve always thought of them as innovative and was attracted by the community of practice. With it being a whole year, we’ve constantly felt supported and encouraged to keep going.”
The pair discovered in one of the first conversations that they were both trained Pilates teachers and so when they were asked to present to the group about their goals, it seemed like the obvious next step to set up a Pilates class at St Luke’s.
“Pilates is all about mindfulness, breathlessness and strength – all key elements of rehabilitative care. So, we advertised the group to patients and a year on still have four of the patients who started with us,” says Charlotte.
“To be honest, it makes my heart sing. We’ve had lovely feedback, and I don’t know how it happens but somehow, something magic happens.”
That bit of magic refers to the open and transparent conversations the Pilates practisers engage in when they finish their half hour exercise routine.
“I just thought they would come, exercise and leave,” Rachel adds. “It’s really surprised me how honest people are. We just sit back, and they talk about depressions, death and dying and use it as a safe place.”
One patient, Stephen, 70, says: “Now I have a positive outlook. I think about what I can do, not what I can’t do, and I take it day by day. Sometimes my wife joins in too. It’s good for me to get out of the house and meet people.”
Having had a very poor prognosis, Stephen is now planning to drive to Austria in his brand-new Audi.
Without the support they received in the community of practice, Rachel and Charlotte don’t believe they would have been able to support people like Stephen fulfil their dreams. “The group helped us think about what we could change,” Rachel says.
“There’s never really been a rehab approach here so it felt like we were tackling something enormous. The group helped us to focus, and it was really empowering and affirming hearing about what the other people in the group were doing.”
Now, buoyed by the success of the Pilates group and the legacy of the support they’ve felt from the community of practice, Charlotte and Rachel have set their sights higher.
“We’ve already got a volunteer reflexologist coming in and we are looking to evolve this into a wellbeing morning,” says Charlotte. “We’re also thinking about trying to run a Pilates class on the ward. We had a staff away day and did a presentation, so all the nurses know what we’re doing and now the community nurses are referring to us.”
Rachel and Charlotte have no doubt that, given availability, they would definitely want to be involved in another community of practice for the “ideas, interaction, friendship and support.”
They plan to keep in touch with their dozen fellow group members and work towards embedding the rehabilitative approach even deeper into the care and support provided at St Luke’s.
St Christopher’s Rehabilitative Palliative Care community of practice is open to anyone who has a passion for the principles of rehabilitative palliative care and would like to make changes to their individual or organisational practice to more encompass these principles. Click here to find out more.
——————–
:: This article was originally published in issue 5 of St Christopher’s Connect magazine, to read the full issue. To read the full magazine, or to sign up to receive future editions, please click here. It is republished here with permission.
Leave a Reply