Local sewing bees are buzzing for Lancaster hospice

People from across the local community have scrubbed up to help keep the staff at St John’s Hospice safe during the coronavirus pandemic.
Hospice at Home nurses Natalie Duncan and Ceri Owen-Wilding with some uniform bags.Hospice at Home nurses Natalie Duncan and Ceri Owen-Wilding with some uniform bags.
Hospice at Home nurses Natalie Duncan and Ceri Owen-Wilding with some uniform bags.

Conscious that hospice staff are continuing to work during this crisis, people from the area have put their creative skills and own money to great use to make uniform bags for the nurses and medical staff.

Karen Hillis, who attends Holy Trinity Church in Bolton-le-Sands, aided by church friends Rosemary Falcous and Sandy James, have made uniform bags for St John’s Hospice at Home nurses.

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In collaboration with Bolton-le-Sands CE Primary School, the children of key workers have helped decorate the beautiful bags, and Karen has now made and donated more than 120 uniform bags and is still ‘sewing strong!’

Karen said: “One of the Hospice at Home nurses was telling me that her and her work friends were struggling with taking their uniforms home in plastic bags, decanting clothes into washing machines and then disposing of potentially contaminated plastic bags.

“I realised there was a really simple way I could help so I contacted Jenny Atkinson, owner of Fabrix in Lancaster, who gave me fabric for the bags at a discounted price.

"Hazel Short, a church friend, donated fabric as well. My friends and I then set about making the bags and working with the children of Bolton-le-Sands School to decorate them.

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“It feels good to be able to help St John’s Hospice. I know they are struggling without many their fundraising activities; this is the time of year when in the past I would have supported St John’s by doing the Moonlight Walk or going to the May plants sale and now there’s nothing like that for the hospice.”

Maddy Bass, director of nursing and quality at St John’s Hospice, said: “It has been a struggle at times to access PPE so the fact that our community have literally got out their own fabric, needle and thread to help us is so heart-warming.

"Our nurses and medical team are really grateful and there’s something special about having finishing a shift with a uniform bag by hospice supporters.”