Wirral Hospice awarded £553k Dept of Health funding

Wirral Hospice St John’s has been awarded £553,274 by the Dept of Health for much-needed redevelopment work of its old day care wing. The funding will allow the Hospice to turn the old single-storey building into a two-floor one, which will create extra space at the Hospice that will benefit its patients, families, staff, volunteers and other professionals across the Wirral.

The Dept of Health grant will go some way to realising our overall plans but completion of the project will also need significant investment from the Hospice itself – which is supported generously by donations from the Wirral community.

The award doesn’t affect the fact that is still costs in excess of £3million a year to provide care for our patients, some of which comes from NHS grants but the large majority is received from the general public who make donations, take part in events, play our weekly lottery and buy goods from our charity shops – to name just a few ways that people support our work.

Our building work on the daycare wing is set to start in the summer and aiming for it to be completed in the spring of 2014. Some disruption for staff and visitors is to be expected but building work will not impact on or compromise patient care.

Julie Gorry, Chief Executive, said “We are absolutely delighted to receive this funding, which will help us better support people from across the Wirral with life-limiting illnesses, as well as their families, friends and carers. It’s an exciting time at the Hospice given that it’s our 30^th Anniversary; so this award is a fantastic start to what will be a very eventful year for us.”

Visit www.wirralhospice.org to find out more about the Hospice’s work.