Children and Young People’s support

Wirral Hospice’s service provides emotional support to children and young people up to the age of 18, whose adult family member is being supported by one of our hospice services.

The service is not able to take direct referrals, but the Children & Young Persons Practitioner can be contacted for advice on 0151 334 2778 #Option 4.

We offer support to parents and adult caregivers to give them the skills and confidence to have open conversations with children and young people about diagnosis, illness and prognosis.

We provide one-to-one support to children, including pre- and post-bereavement support.

Sessions are activity-based to encourage conversation and support the child or young person to understand their feelings and emotions.

We offer support with memory making through creating memory boxes, memory bears, and letter writing. Sessions are individually tailored to support families in expressing their feelings for the person who is dying.

Support can be offered at home, in school or at the hospice and we may also signpost on to other support services, such as counselling, when appropriate.

We are able to speak to schools, colleges and universities about what support children and young people need, including identifying keyworkers to help create a plan of support around the child or young person.

Other areas where our children and young people’s support service may be able to assist:

• Children and young people’s family day
• Provision of age-appropriate written information around grief and loss
• Signpost to other appropriate services for families, children and young people locally and nationally
• Support for carers, including practical, emotional and physiological support
• We also aim to support visits onto the inpatient unit; we understand that it can be daunting for children and adults and want to help make any visits as comfortable as possible

AS part of our day-to-day work, Wirral Hospice’s clinical and medical teams monitor and analyse different aspects of our hospice care and support services. We present findings at relevant conferences. (Click on photo below to enlarge poster).