LONGFIELD Hospice has been there for people in Stroud throughout lockdown, offering support to patients, carers and their loved ones when they’ve needed it most.

Now it is asking for the public’s help so it can continue its work for many years to come.

It has set up the Heart of Longfield Fund, and is now encouraging people to give what they can each month so the hospice can plan ahead with greater confidence for the provision of its free services.

Every area of the hospice’s work from day therapy to counselling and Hospice at Home has been affected in some way by Covid-19 and it has quickly had to find new ways of offering support to people.

Carers have been working round the clock in extra PPE to look after people in their own homes and the day therapy team have continued to offer help and advice for patients remotely to ensure they are not alone during the lockdown.

Hospice at Home healthcare assistant Tracey Halliday said the team were working hard to reassure families despite the current restrictions in place.

“When we show up at a patient’s home with all our PPE on, it can be hard as they can’t see our faces. I think a face speaks first to someone, so I just hope they can see kind eyes instead,” she said.

“With the current situation, we do stay longer and talk more and to give them the reassurance that we are there for them, even if we can’t give them the big hug that we want to give them.”

A new telephone counselling service has also been started offering bereavement counselling and a listening ear for people who have been affected by life-limiting illnesses such as cancer, Parkinson’s, heart failure and Motor Neurone disease. There is already a waiting list for the service with extra staff recruited to work alongside existing specially trained volunteer counsellors to meet demand.

Everyone at the hospice has worked hard to adapt at a time when its 20 charity shops have been closed for some, and fundraising events cancelled. While many of the stores have now re-opened providing a much-needed revenue stream, the hospice is still in need of further income.

The Heart of Longfield Fund has been launched to encourage people to set up a monthly donation to help provide more long-term financial support for the hospice in Minchinhampton.

Chief Executive Simon Bernstein said: “Although the lockdown has eased and we have begun to re-open some of our shops, we could be forced to close them again should the Coronavirus return. We may also have to suspend fundraising events that we’ve postponed once already.

“By setting up a regular monthly gift now, it will give us the security of knowing that we can rely on that income to run our services even if there is a second wave.”

Samantha Monks set up a regular donation after her dad Peter Jones was cared for by the Hospice at Home team.

He was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer in July 2019 and by October that year, he needed palliative care. The Hospice at Home team visited him every day so he could remain at the family home in Gloucester. He died on January 27th this year aged 75.

“The Longfield team visited him at home two to three times a day and he loved the banter they would have with him and I’m sure this helped him achieve his goal of having one last Christmas,” Samantha said.

“I have seen how kind and compassionate they were with both my parents during this time, nothing was ever too much. He wouldn’t have been able to be at home with his family without Longfield and that’s why I have set up a regular monthly gift to allow them to help other people just like my dad.”

A monthly donation of:

• £10 could provide protective gloves for a Hospice at Home carer for one week

• £20 could pay for a nurse or carer’s uniform

• £60 could pay for a daytime visit by two carers to someone with a life-limiting illness.

• £100 could pay for three telephone counselling sessions with a trained professional.

Every person who sets up a new monthly donation will be able to add a name to a heart to be hung on its special wall at the hospice. They will also receive regular updates on its work.

To set up a monthly gift or a one-off donation, please visit longfield.org.uk/heart-of-longfield-fund