This Hospice Care Week whic ends on October 12, Rowcroft Hospice is joining hospices across the UK to celebrate the extraordinary difference hospice care makes to patients and families every single day.

With the theme for this year’s Hospice Care Week ‘Hospice care is more than you think’, Rowcroft is highlighting the many ways that care goes beyond what most people imagine – not just in its Inpatient Unit, but in homes and communities right across South Devon.

At Rowcroft, hospice care is about so much more than pain relief, medical support and symptom management.

It’s about helping people to live as well as possible in the time they have, and offering compassion, comfort and dignity through life’s most difficult moments.

Each year, Rowcroft cares for around 2,500 patients and their loved ones across South Devon.

With 80 per cent of patients supported in the community, Rowcroft’s Community and Hospice at Home teams enable people with life-limiting illnesses to remain in the place they most want to be – usually their own home – and to avoid unnecessary hospital admissions at the end of life.

Hospice UK has launched a nationwide campaign urging people to write to their MP to ask them to attend a special parliamentary event on October 15 where MPs will hear what local hospices need to secure their future, care for more patients, and support the NHS.

Rowcroft’s CEO Mark Hawkins said:

“Hospice care is a lifeline for thousands of families in South Devon and across the UK. But without urgent action, many services will be forced to shrink at the very time when demand is growing.”

To add your voice to the Hospice UK campaign, go to:

Or if you’d like to make a donation to support Rowcroft Hospice, visit: www.rowcrofthospice.org.uk