St Helena Hospice: 'We don't take life for granted, we help people drink life to the very last drop'

Relatives can feel helpless, and patients sometimes feel like a burden.

But staff at St Helena Hospice in Colchester are determined to show hospices are not, by any means, a sad place to work.

This week is Hospice Care Week but staff at the hospice serving north Essex live by the principle that every day matters.

Dr Karen Chumbley, clinical director of the hospice in Colchester, said as an experienced GP, she knew the strength of feeling for the hospice.

She said: “I’m a Colchester girl and there’s something special in that local people identify so strongly with the hospice. There’s that sense of being part of something that makes our community richer.”

As a GP her contact with the hospice was limited to referring patients but she says her work at the hospice has opened her eyes to a unique style of care.

“When I started, after my first weekend on the ward I remember being really moved,” she said. “My eyes filled with tears because, for the first time in a long time, I had the time to talk to pa - tients and relatives in a manner that was appropriate.

“Suddenly I had an hour to talk to someone. That never happens in general practice. You have ten minutes, maybe 20 if you stretch it.”

She was also surprised by the breadth of the services offered including groups for men with cancer and for carers as well as friendship, art and gardening groups.

Although those who have had no contact with the hospice may think of it as a gloomy place, Dr Chumbley says the reality is different.

She said: “If you work in the hospice you don’t take life for granted. I think there is perhaps more laughter than there is elsewhere in healthcare, much more living and the key things in life are all on the surface, so it’s the antithesis of gloomy.

“The hospice is all about living and about dying. We try to help people drink life dry to the last drop.

“People do die but many people who come into the inpatient unit come in for symptom relief and go home.”

She recalled a man who was isolated with his illness but as he loved to paint he started attending the art class and she said it gave him a new lease of life.

She added: “We’ve had people get married here and we’ve had people who wanted day trips to the seaside.

“One lady wanted to visit the Tiptree jam factory because she had never been, or it can be quite simple things like going out for lunch with their family.”

As well as providing social activities, the hospice focusses intently on care.

“It’s mutually supportive,” she said. “When someone dies, it’s acceptable to pause and maybe light a candle or have some silence or talk about your feelings. “That’s enriching and allows people to be able to carry on working.”

Her interest in palliative care goes back many years. As a GP in Colchester, Dr Chumbley helped gather information from patients in their last year of life so their wishes could be made known.

“We found by thinking proactively we decreased the proportion of people who died in hospital,” she said.

“Far more people could be looked after in the place of their preference in their last days and weeks.”

The project developed into the My Care Choices Register, which allows people to record how they would like to be cared for at the end of their life.

She said: “People think hospice care is only for people who are dying soon, so they decline support until late on.

“I would encourage anyone living with a life-limiting illness to talk to their GP about the support available, and the expertise so they can live more fully.

“Don’t wait too long to consider hospice care because it’s about living as long as you can, as well as you can.”

To find out more about the hospice go to www.sthelenahospice.org.uk.

Finding support from others through art, chat and friendship

WHEN Keith Taylor was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2011, he had no clue what staying at a hospice would feel like. 

The 79-year-old retired stock controller, from Colchester, was frightened – but staff at St Helena Hospice have changed his view.

He has since joined the hospice’s service user group, a group of people including patients, carers and family members, who advise hospice management from their own experiences of hospice services.

“I want to get across the message about our work,” he said. 
“I want to help dispel the pre-conceived idea that a hospice generates fear and is a sad place; a place to go to die. It is not.

“We must encourage one and all that the fear can be overcome, that a good end of life is true and that hospice is not always the end.”

Keith has attended the hospice’s art and craft group, one of the activities run by the therapies and wellbeing team. While drawing and painting members talk to each other about their different illnesses.

He said: “It doesn’t matter what your art standards are.

“The art is a vehicle for talking to people, hearing people’s experiences. 

“People may think ‘Why me?’ And then you begin to realise it’s not just you. Listen and take from their experiences and get on with your life.

“It means everything to me. It’s my one main interest which I can take home with me. It just sort of encourages me. Just seeing other people and the way they work. It’s encouragement to have social friend, you can so easily get cut off.”

Keith will soon be going for his second week-long respite stay at the hospice’s inpatient unit at Myland Hall, which will not only give him a rest, but is a chance for his wife to have a break from routine too. 

“It changed me,” he said. “It did me good and not only that, it did my wife good. It’s all very positive. My wife texted me and said ‘I haven’t seen you so happy for a long time’.

“She is able to come here too and talk to other people. She has counselling with the chaplaincy team and they’ve helped her, so it’s for the whole family, and I find that is so helpful. She is also coming here for reflexology.” 

Keith has attended the hospice’s One Day at a Time men’s cancer group, offering the opportunity to meet new people and learn about living fully despite the effects of illness.

He said: “Men are so tight-lipped about talking about things like that.
“But at the group we talk to people and encourage each other. It makes a whole world of difference to people’s lives trying to help them cope with it.

“There are things said that I hadn’t really thought about. I began to come out a bit more myself. The art group had already helped a lot and got me out of the first stage of depression. 

“It’s a good social time but it’s also interesting to see other people and how illness is affecting a particular person. We’ve all experienced similar things in the group and it’s a relaxed, friendly atmosphere.”

He said his initial fright when he was first diagnosed didn’t last long thanks to the hospice. 

He said: “I was thinking about the pain, it’s an insidious disease, cancer, because I’ve never felt any real pain and yet it’s gradually creeping. 

“But laughter for me has come into quite a lot of it. I thought, you’ve got to take this in a light-hearted way.

“I didn’t know a thing about hospices before. It’s not what you think it is, it’s not a place of dying. 

“I think the hospice staff and volunteers are very special. Not many people have those credentials. You can’t really describe it because the people are so special.”