Summary
This week we are launching our winter appeal – ‘We are here for you, will you be here for us?’. As hospices across the country face ongoing financial challenges, and many face heartbreaking decisions about care, CEO Stuart Palma shares our call for support and our determination to be here for Sussex families for many more years to come.
Stuart Palma, CEO, Southern Hospice Group
This winter, we are having to make some difficult decisions.
Hospices nationwide are facing a funding crisis, and we are not immune. Government funding for our vital care hasn’t kept pace with rising costs, and growing demand for our services is adding to the challenge – especially as winter approaches.
There are more families we want to support, but instead we’re having to make tough decisions about which services we can provide. So, we have made a choice: to ask for support now, so we can keep on caring for local families in the future. It’s that or face a future none of us want to imagine – one without local hospice care.
The numbers don’t add up
Hospices like ours have provided essential palliative and end-of-life care for decades, supporting people in their own homes and our hospices. We’ve kept people out of A&E and made it possible for them to die in peace in the place they have chosen, surrounded by their loved ones.
But the numbers don’t add up. Last year, it cost £34 million to run our services across all three hospices. This figure has gone up and up as the cost of living has risen – 22% since 2020 – and it’s far more than we receive in government funding.
We’re calling for this to change and are doing everything we can to make sure the hospices are here in years to come – but we can’t keep on running at a loss.
Marc spoke to us recently from his home in Brighton.
Our supporters are helping families be together when it matters most
Together, our supporters have already made a difference in so many ways. They’ve helped families be together at the end of their loved one’s life. They’ve sent nurses to provide care and support when all hope seemed lost. They’ve helped make precious memories for local families and kept people living independently until the end.
Families like Marc’s. He’s living with terminal cancer and has been supported in his home and at one of our hospices, Martlets, with a range of support from nursing care to counselling and physiotherapy. Meeting Marc brought home to me just why we need to keep pressing for change.
Marc has been a huge supporter of ours for several years and, even now – as he faces his illness and future – he is using his voice to raise awareness about the reality facing families like his. I am so proud that he agreed to be part of our campaign; I was deeply moved by what he told me. We met in the lead up to the campaign, and he explained how our specialist palliative care has transformed his quality of life and given him precious time together with his husband Perrie; time they’ve spent doing the things they love and making memories for Perrie to cherish in the years ahead.
With us at his side, Marc is living his life in a way he, Perrie and their dog Gizmo choose, and that is thanks to the safety, comfort and dignity hospice care brings. Who wouldn’t want that for their loved one? But his biggest fear remains that he wouldn’t get the choice to die where he wanted – at the hospice – or to have those he loved by his side when it mattered most because he had been taken back to hospital.
He said: “It scares me to think about what would have happened if hospice care had not been available to me up to now. We’ve had moments where I’ve been so unwell I couldn’t even speak on the phone, but my husband Perrie has been able to call the hospice for immediate assistance. They know me and Perrie and understand the support I need which has saved us from heading to A&E.”
He also told me his experience makes him want to fight to keep hospice care going not just for himself, but for all the families who might need it in the future – and I share his passion and commitment.
Marc with Gizmo (left) and in hospital receiving treatment (right)
Our promise to you
We’re working hard to ensure we have a palliative and end-of-life care service that will be here for you, long into the future – but we can only do it with support.
Together, with our local communities by our side, we can make a difference. Over the past year alone, our community teams have carried out more than 16,000 visits, supporting 2,400 individuals in their own homes – invaluable support for families who face the devastating decline and loss of a loved one.
Will you help us now so we can keep on caring in the years to come?
Hospice care fit for the future
Like you, I want a world where people have the power to choose where they die – whether that is at home or on one of our wards – and have access to the specialist palliative care they need, right until the end. Where they are given the comfort and dignity of a good death, surrounded by the people they love. Hospice care is about giving people the choice to live well and make memories with the time they have left, and to die well, in a place they want to be, with the people they want to be with.
We have the expertise and compassion to make this a reality for so many more people. Will you be here for us this winter, so we can be here for local families like Marc’s – and for you and your loved ones, should you need us?
Donate now so we can keep on caring
Will you make a donation today to ensure Martlets can continue providing life-changing care?
With your support we can keep on caring for families across Brighton and Hove and the surrounding area – families like Marc’s.