Last updated 19 July 2021

This information details on how ellenor is supporting compassionate visiting arrangements for patients in our care on the Inpatient Ward during the current Coronavirus pandemic.

The aim of this information is to minimise the risk of infection whilst also allowing close family members to maintain face-to-face contact with their loved ones, and to say goodbye if their loved ones are at the end of their lives.

On Arrival at The Hospice

All staff and visitors must follow the process below:

• Visitors should press the bell to the left of the door, the Host will let you in. Out of Hours please be patient as the ward staff will open the door as soon as possible, but there may be a delay if they are busy caring for patients.
• You must wear a face covering unless exempt.
• Visitors must report to the Host Desk where the Host will notify the appropriate person of their arrival.
• All staff and visitors will be required to wash their hands when entering the building , this can help to prevent and slow the spread of coronavirus. You should wash your hands for 20 seconds, using soap and water.
• Visitors must not wander around the building.
• Visitors should remain at least 1 metre away from others.

Visiting The Inpatient Ward

In line with Government guidance, we are currently allowing a maximum of 4 named visitors for each patient on the ward. These 4 named persons are not interchangeable at any time. Each patient is allowed a maximum of 2 hours visiting per day with no more than 2 visitors around the bed at any one time.

• On entering the ward all visitors will be required to change their face covering to a surgical face mask and sanitise their hands. This will be supervised by a member of Ward Staff.
• Visitors to the Inpatient Ward should remain at the patient’s bedside for the duration of their visit. Staff will ensure that visitors know how to use the call bell if they need anything.
• On leaving the Ward, visitors must remove the surgical mask and place it in the yellow bin and replace it with their own face covering, wash their hands again with soap and water for at least 20 seconds before they leave, and then again as soon as they get home.
• As an organisation, ellenor is keen to support patients to stay in touch by enhancing family liaison arrangements to provide updates to the next of kin, and this will be provided by a daily telephone call from a clinician if the next of kin is unable to visit.

Connection To a Loved One

ellenor is very keen to encourage 'virtual visits' for patients, and is also able to accommodate alternatives to get messages across:

• Face Time, Zoom or Skype calls are encouraged if families wish to arrange this with staff and ellenor has internet connected kit available to facilitate this type of contact.
• A phone is available for patients to receive a call from their friends and families.
• Messages/photographs can be emailed in and printed for delivery to patients.
• Staff can take delivery of a phone for a patient’s use from their families/friends, and there are multi-chargers on the Ward.
• ellenor can provide tokens that create physical connection between the dying person and their relatives.
• Cards with personal messages can be written and staff will deliver these to a loved one.
• Flowers are acceptable - deliveries should be made to reception and staff will ensure your gift gets to your relative/friend.

Living Well and Wellbeing Services

Our face to face Living Well and Wellbeing Services, including Seated Exercise Group, Bereavement Cuppas, Carers Cuppas, Walk and Talk group, are gradually being re-introduced in line with Government guidance. Please contact the team on 01474 320007 if you would like to attend or require further information.

Care Home Support Team

Most care homes have closed their doors to visitors. We are still advising on palliative care by phone and contacting the care homes as usual. We will only be making essential visits to protect the elderly and vulnerable.

Our Hospice at Home Community Team

To keep patients and their families safe, our Hospice at Home Community Team will now offer support primarily via phone - although home visits may still be available following telephone assessment, with additional procedures in place to limit the risk of infection for themselves and for their patients.

We are increasing our phone contact to patients and families we currently support and staying in close contact with other professionals to ensure best supportive care.

Children’s Service

We are working closely with Public Health England/NHS England guidelines to maintain our services for those children and young people.

We want to keep in touch with you and will continue to offer our support  to you all during this time. We are maintaining business as usual as far as we can but, as you will understand, we have had to make some changes to how we deliver our care. This is to protect your family as well our staff and the wider community.

We are exploring ways to resume some aspects of our service that were suspended but will be doing this carefully and safely, in line with guidance from our local CCG’s.

Our working hours are currently 9-5pm Monday- Friday.

Video calls are available and we are using Zoom to provide virtual visits and some  music and play therapy sessions. Zoom is a free app which can be used on any device and this will allow you to communicate more directly with a member of our team.

Face to face visits , sessions and groups are gradually being re-introduced in line with government guidance.  Our priorities are to provide acute oncology treatment, urgent assessments and end of life care for children. This is in accordance with the current national directives for Community paediatric services.

We are working very closely with other Children’s community teams, Children’s Hospices, local hospitals and Tertiary centres across our whole area to continue to provide care.

Our Cafe and Public seating area

We have made the decision to close our cafe to the public, but we will continue to provide hot meals for our patients on the ward, visiting relatives and friends of patient’s staff and volunteers working at the hospice. We will be operating a reduced hot menu option but will have sandwiches and cold items available. We thank you for your understanding. We will keep you informed of the situation.

The difference between a Face Covering and a Face Mask

Surgical Face Masks are for use in the inpatient ward and other patient facing interactions including home visits/clinics/counselling. They are not a replacement for social distancing and regular handwashing which remain the most important actions. Surgical face masks are designed to be normally worn in medical settings to limit the spread of infections. Wearing them should be very limited outside of healthcare activities because they are not generally considered to be PPE in non-healthcare situations.

Unlike face coverings, they:

• Are manufactured to a recognised standard.
• Are resistant to droplets of fluids and splashes.

Face coverings are not a replacement for social distancing and regular handwashing which remain the most important actions. The UK government is advising use of face coverings in area where social distancing may not be possible. The evidence suggests that wearing a face covering does not protect you, but it may protect others if you are infected and have not developed symptoms.

Face coverings are not classed as PPE:

• They are not manufactured to a recognised standard and not CE marked.
• They do not provide a proven level of protection for work risks such as dust and spray.

Supporters

Your support is vital in helping us provide care and support to patients and their families and during this unprecedented time, your support is even more important.

We have had to postpone some of our fundraising events which raise funds to allow us to continue supporting our community. However, we are looking at ideas for virtual events so that we can still raise the funds we need. If you have any suggestions, please do get in touch with our Fundraising Team.

Some third-party events have also affected, including the Virgin Money London Marathon and Brighton Marathon. Please visit our Events page for information on each of our events.

If you require any advice about your own fundraising activity, or events you are participating in, please contact our Fundraising Team via email supportercare@ellenor.org or call 01322 626509 for further information and we will be pleased to offer support as best we can.

Over the coming days and weeks, our fundraising teams will be reaching out to let you know what we are doing and the changes we are making to our fundraising plans for the coming year.

Thank you for your continued and much valued support, you can continue supporting us by donating. We still need your valued support.

Volunteers

We are incredibly grateful to all our volunteers whose help and support ellenor is invaluable. In line with staff notifications, we are signposting our volunteers to government advice and our Human Resources department. Our volunteers are critical to help keep our retail shops open, services running and keep providing beverages and meals for our patients and their families.

We want to thank all our volunteers for their commitment and continued support during these very difficult times. They really are extraordinary.

Shops

For the latest information about our shops, please click here.

Recruitment and Training and Education

Any recruitment we are holding at the moment will be changed from Face to Face to Telephone Interviews. Our current training learning and education programmes have been postponed until further notice.
Staff.

Our valued staff are absolutely critical to the operation of our services, and we are taking all the necessary measures to ensure that we can deliver this safely and with minimal disruption throughout this difficult period. We would like to thank our staff for their tireless commitment to ellenor and for doing all they can to minimise infection and keep our services going.

THANK YOU SO MUCH

• Visitors will be advised by staff to follow the Government’s Guidance to stay at home/self-isolate if they become unwell with signs of COVID 19, and to contact NHS 111.
• Arrangements will be subject to change pending Government Guidance, and relevant requirements for PPE and the need to maintain social distancing between visitors, staff and other patients. We will keep this under regular review.