A children’s hospice is looking to expand its nursing workforce to meet rising demand for palliative care services in North London.
Elisha Lewis, head of clinical services at Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospice, told Nursing Times that a “depleted” nursing workforce across the country was posing a challenge to recruitment, especially for specialist settings.
“All children’s hospices are in dire need of staff”
Elisha Lewis
Ms Lewis’ organisation has recently set about a drive to recruit Agenda for Change band 5 and 6 nurses, as well as band 3 and 4 specialist carers.
This recruitment campaign was launched, in part, to help ensure children, and their families, who would otherwise slip through the cracks are cared for, she said.
“Currently, we have just over 350 children on our caseload,” she said.
“But… there are around 2,500 [children in need of our care] within our catchment area of North Central London.
“We’re only seeing 350, so there’s a lot more work to be done.”
Ms Lewis said “need is growing” for children’s palliative care services, particularly in her organisation’s patch, and that recruiting the right workforce was a struggle for hospices.
“If you look at staffing across the NHS, it’s depleted. If you look at children’s nursing, that’s a really small pool, if you look at children’s palliative care nursing, it’s even smaller.”
She added: “All children’s hospices are in dire need of staff. They really want to be able to deliver services to children and their families, but without nurses and specialist carers, we just can’t do as much as we want to do.
“We want to do more.”
In particular, Noah’s Ark is hoping to improve service coverage for neonates.
Ms Lewis said a challenge the hospice faced was ensuring these prospective patients were referred, and that getting the right workforce was a necessary step towards achieving this.
As well as this, Ms Lewis said the hospice was looking to further expand its clinical offer for people in transition from children’s to adult’s palliative care.
These patients, typically between 18 and 25, currently receive support, but not clinical care, from the hospice.
“It’s something that we will be looking to do in the future, but until we’re able to establish our workforce, we can’t even think about doing that yet,” she said.
“Every day is very different. You cannot get bored here… I love that”
Elisha Lewis
Ms Lewis added: “Everybody is looking for amazing, skilled nurses. It’s a problem nationwide, within the NHS and… hospices.”
The Noah’s Ark campaign is backed by television actress Sarah Parish, who alongside her actor husband James Murray, are funding dramatherapy sessions at the hospice via The Murray Parish Trust, founded after their daughter died of a congenital heart defect in 2009.
Asked why nurses should consider a career hospice care, Ms Lewis said working in the charity sector offered more flexibility than being in the NHS.
She added: “Every day is very different. You cannot get bored here… I love that.
“I can be super clinical, but also encompass play into the care that I deliver.
“The team are really supportive, it’s like a family here and everybody has the same goal: families and children are at the centre of everything we do.”
Ms Lewis said the work was challenging, with some children arriving into the hospice’s care with complex conditions, or combinations of conditions.
The hospice, as well as expanding its workforce, recently invested in a bespoke simulation training doll, which is used to develop both new recruits and existing staff on-site.
Ms Lewis added: “It’s vital that we attract, secure and retain quality candidates for these roles so we can offer more choice to our existing families and also support more children and families in the community that need us.”
