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Playing our part... the medical and care team


In 2009/2010... ● The charity supported 245 families for 815 stays, representing 3,458 bed nights


● Our doctors worked closely with the Oxford Radcliffe Hospital Trust’s team specialising in care for teenagers and young adults, and with their paediatric and neonatal intensive care units. This sharing of expertise has resulted in more referrals to Helen & Douglas House for children and young adults with very complex conditions


● To date, we have worked alongside teams at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital, Oxford University, Oxford Brookes University, Sobell House Hospice, Children’s Hospices UK, ACT and Cardiff University on advancing children’s palliative medicine


● In March 2010 the International Journal of Palliative Nursing awarded Liz Cornish, Head of Care at Douglas House its highest accolade for promoting excellence in the delivery of non-cancer related palliative care


Palliative care for children and young people is an active and total approach to care, embracing physical, emotional, social and spiritual elements. It focuses on enhancement of quality of life for patients with life-shortening conditions and support for their families, through the management of distressing symptoms and care through death and bereavement.


Helen & Douglas House has specialist palliative care expertise in-house, which is vital for the treatment of patients with increasingly severe and difficult conditions. It is the knowledge, skill and understanding of this team that often sets


Helen & Douglas House apart and our experience in this emerging specialty is frequently sought both nationally and internationally. Through one-to-one care, the doctors and nurses are able to spend time with the young person to get to know their specific needs, and through close observation they are able to relieve distressing symptoms and respond to sometimes changing priorities. These sessions not only deal with their physical needs, but also look at their wider care needs, including working with others to help them with the transition from children’s services into mainstream adult services.


‘I spoke to someone at the end of their shift today and they had spent part of their morning in the music room with one of the young people and a volunteer. They had gone through every musical they could think of, singing all the hit songs, and she said she couldn’t remember when she last laughed so much... It can be a very sad place, it can be very challenging, but the flip


side is that it can also be great fun.’ Liz Cornish, Head of Care at Douglas House


In 2009/2010 the charity supported 245 families for 815 stays, representing 3,458 bed nights


Helen & Douglas House Playing our part Annual Review 2009/2010


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