Tynedale Hospice at Home

General information

Tynedale Hospice at Home was founded in 1994 having recently celebrated 21 years of care.

The brainchild of founder members Ish Fawcett and Edith Russell, Tynedale Community Hospice was first incorporated in 1993 and registered as a charity early the following year.

Ish and Edith’s vision was to be able to provide professional, holistic, high quality palliative care for those living in Tynedale and West Northumberland enabling those who wish to be live to the end of their lives in the comfort and security of their own homes, rather than in a strange hospital environment away from their own communities.

Since its inception, Tynedale Hospice at Home has grown significantly and now provides home nursing care, a volunteer hospital driver service, and adult and children’s bereavement services. Our children's bereavement service, The Rainbow Project, is open to anyone living in the area, regardless of whether or not their families have previously been cared for by the Hospice.

Responsibility for the strategic development of the Hospice lies with a Board of Trustees which meets regularly and works together with staff to provide a strategic vision and policy framework for the ongoing work of the Hospice. Also on the Board is the Hospice Director, Alison Hands appointed in May 2015. In turn, she is responsible for a small team of staff supported by volunteers.

We currently have about 250 volunteers who undertake many different functions and without whom we simply would not be able to provide our services. Where possible we are integrating volunteers more and more into our teams so that we can spread the load as well as accommodate each volunteer’s individual circumstances.

In our first 21 years we believe that we have matured into an established and professional service.