Palliative care pledge to work together

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TWO appeals aiming to improve the quality of care given to terminally ill people in the Great Yarmouth and Waveney area have confirmed they are running alongside one another. In a joint statement released on Tuesday the James Paget University Hospital and Yare Hospice Care said they would work together to ensure services available locally were the best they could be. John Hemming, JPH trust chairman, said: “We are very much aware that having two charitable appeals in the same locality for the care of people who are dying has caused some confusion among patients and the wider community and we will aim to make the purposes of both charities clear. We have the public's best interest at our core, and we want to work alongside each other to develop palliative care services.” The Palliative Care East appeal, run the JPH, is aiming to raise £1.5m to build a palliative care centre in the grounds of the hospital site. It will be an outpatient and visitor centre and offer a family focused environment to support patients and their families whose lives are affected by cancer and other life-threatening illnesses. The Yare Hospice Care appeal is quite different. The independent charity is seeking to build a £2m combined ten bed hospice and day care unit that will add a missing dimension to local patient choice by providing specialist inpatient beds for respite and end of life care. Set in its own grounds appeal organisers say the building and its landscaped gardens will inspire hospitality, care and wellbeing to patients, staff and families alike. Chairman of Yare Hospice Care appeal Jennifer Beesley said: “I am tremendously excited by the progress we have made and very encouraged by the many voices of support from the local community. There is plenty of room for both appeals in Yarmouth.”