Hospices across the UK are having to make difficult decisions. St Catherine's Hospice is one of them.
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In early 2024, recognising the impact of rapid inflation (c26%) since mid 2020 (the ‘cost of living’ impacts on costs and donor propensity to be able to give) and with projected income from our two NHS statutory funding sources also adjudged to remain largely flat, StCH Board approved a cost reduction programme as the projection for voluntary income (then nearly 80% of our total) could not sustain our projected cost base (80% of which is staffing).
The Board approved a reduction programme set a target to reduce all costs by some 12.5% and after consultation, 40 roles were removed. As part of this, almost every team went through consultation to amend our ways of operating while our entire community care model was revamped to set out a focus on specialist provision only.
The community care model pins into NHS Neighbourhood provision and has been largely successful though we remain under pressure to meet community demand. Bedded capacity stayed at 12 beds in operation and we continue to explore bringing our further 12 into permanent use (2 pilot programmes are ongoing at this time). The Wellbeing model is also having to be reviewed afresh as the new community model means we are typically seeing patient later in the journey and it can be harder for these patients to access wellbeing support in a timely way. Work is therefore ongoing.
StCH supporters were shocked that StCH was forced to make these cuts and it was announced on BBC news alongside HospiceUK and, they have responded with great understanding to the arguments for fair funding and the (over) reliance on voluntary income.
