Salome Smith and Jenny Ford, who did the handover on behalf of the Avril Elizabeth Home, were taken on a tour of Stepping Stone’s In-Patient Unit in New Market Park by Clinical Services Manager, Sr Sheryl Newman, who explained the ins and outs of what Stepping Stone is about and the care services the hospice offers.

The Avril Elizabeth Home provides residential and day care to intellectually disabled people of all ages and races, and has been doing so for the past 46 years.

Like Stepping Stone Hospice, they too rely on the generosity of donors and it’s becoming more and more apparent that organizations such as theirs, as well as hospice, are set to rely more and more on each other as funding becomes increasingly scarce due to the current economic and political climate.

Says Stepping Stone Hospice’s Clinical Services Manager, Sr Sheryl Newman: “We are finding that state patient numbers are on the increase, and there’s no ‘what happens afterwards’ plan for the families when these patients pass away. Often, it’s the children that are most affected.”

Not only that, but children that are hospice patients themselves need somewhere to be cared for and thankfully there are places like Lambano, in Malvern East, which is a care and paediatric medical step-down facility/hospice for children with life-limiting and life-threatening illnesses.

“We support Lambano as a hospice,” says Sr Sheryl, “so just as the Avril Elizabeth Home has paid it forward to our hospice today, we will do the same.”

Watch this space…

Caption: Jenny Ford and Salome Smith (far left) from the Avril Elizabeth Home, along with the Stepping Stone Hospice team at the nappy handover on Thursday, 20 April.