Weldmar
Hospice Trust
The Weldmar
Hospicecare Trust is an independent charity working in Dorset. All services are
provided free of charge with 75% of the funds needed raised locally and the NHS
gives the rest. The hospice trust is the only agency providing specialist palliative
care in north, south and west Dorset.
The job of the Trust
is to support people in Dorset affected by cancer and other life-limiting
diseases, largely at the end of life and they work both with patients and their
families. They also provide respite services for people with complex long-term
progressive conditions. As the only specialist agency in the area the trust
also educates colleagues in primary care and the acute and independent sectors
on how to deliver high quality generalist palliative care.
Patients can live at
home with specialist nursing support services, social groups and day hospices
in Weymouth, Dorchester and Shaftesbury. People needing in-patient services
come to Joseph Weld Hospice in Dorchester for symptom control, respite or end
of life care. Doctors, nurses,
physiotherapists, occupational therapists, a chaplain, complementary
therapists, art and music therapists, social workers, bereavement workers and
over 250 patient care volunteers work with patients to provide care and support.
The Trust is governed
by a Board of Trustees headed by Chairman Dr Geoffrey Guy and supported by an Advisory
Council. The Care Quality Commission regulates their services and the Charity
Commission and Companies House regulate their business. There were originally three charities,
CancerCare Dorset (formerly West Dorset Macmillan Service), Joseph Weld Hospice
and Trimar Hospice and the services merged between 2003-2004 to form Weldmar
Hospicecare Trust. You can read about the Hospice Trust here
Funds come from legacies,
Friends of Weldmar Hospicecare Trust fundraising activities, community
fundraising, major events, a chain of shops and investments. The NHS also funds
a small proportion of services. The trust runs 19 shops and three furniture outlets throughout Dorset, read about their activities here
As I am a
volunteer in my local Weldmar hospice charity shop, I thought I would base my
assignment around it as it is a good example of a well-run profitable
outlet. The staff profile at the
majority of shops consists of the following: one full time paid manager and one part time deputy manager, with a bank of
stand in managers who work when needed.
The rest of the staff is made up of unpaid volunteers who work in
four-hour shifts from Monday to Saturday.
The hours for each shift are 9.00 am – 1.00 pm and 1.00 pm to 5.00
pm. On Sundays the shop is covered by a
separate deputy manager who opens from 10.00 am – 4.00 pm as regulated by
Sunday trading laws. The hospice shops
are open every day except Christmas and Boxing Day, New Year’s Day and Easter
Sunday. Most volunteers work one or two
shifts per week depending on their other commitments in and around the town.
The Lyme Regis
hospice shop has on average one or two volunteers per shift making a total of 15 volunteers associated with this shop. Their ages range from a 16-year old youth,
one man in his 50s, approximately three or four women in their 40s and the rest
are women in their 50s/60s. The age profile
has changed over the past 18 months since the introduction of a computerized
till system and a new manager who is in her mid 40s. When the new till system was introduced
to the shop several older women were unable to grasp a new and more
complicated way of working and left.
New volunteers are always being encouraged to join by way of adverts in
the shops themselves, appeals in local papers and now the use of Facebook social media.
The duties of the volunteer can consist
of some or all of the following:
- Using
the till
- Advising customers where to find articles
- Hanging clothes and tidying the shop including sorting clothing on the racks, arranging bric-a-brac on the shelves,
- Accepting donated goods, registering donors under the charity Gift Aid scheme and allocating their registered details to donated goods
- Sorting clothing for sale and recycling
- Preparing items for sale by washing or steaming, pricing, etc.
- Packing and receipting goods at the point of sale.
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