Hospice to help people earlier in end-of-life care

St Peter's Hospice hopes community hubs will help more people with life-limiting illnesses "live as fully as possible"

A hospice says it wants to provide earlier support to more people receiving end-of-life care through community hubs.

St Peter's Hospice said the service will be available every Monday morning at the Beehive Community Centre in Whitehall, Bristol, with more locations planned across the rest of the city, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire in the future.

The hubs will offer emotional support, practical advice and wellbeing activities to those with life-limiting illnesses and their families and carers.

Chris Benson, from St Peter's Hospice, said: "Currently, we only reach about a third of those needing end-of-life care, and we want to do more."

"The hubs will give us an opportunity to do just that, by expanding our reach into more neighbourhoods, we can help more people to live as fully as possible," he added.

Rachael James, therapy team manager for the charity, said the hubs will also offer a "safe place" for people to drop in, connect and talk.

"Our wellbeing service is all about people, how they can live as well from the very start of their diagnosis, through their journey all the way to the end," she said.

She added that at the moment they are seeing people "far too late" to teach them how to live well, as they are "quite poorly".

"We want people to feel supported and have the right information at the very start - at diagnosis when there's no more medical treatment for them," she said.

"So they can learn 'how to' tips and tricks, on how to live well."

Wayne Barry said the community hubs will help people connect and talk

Wayne Barry, 68, from Bedminster, has already taken part in the hospice's wellbeing groups - set up to connect patients with each other and build confidence - but said the new community hub will be more convenient.

"I wouldn't have met these people before, and yet we all live in the same city, maybe even walked past each other before," he said.

"We all have a common denominator - we're all not well.

"I've made some nice friends in the groups that I'll continue talking to and meeting up with. It's not the end, it's just the beginning."