Volunteer with Blythe House Hospice

We’re very fortunate and proud to have a team of over 250 volunteers supporting the hospice on a regular basis. They play an integral and vital role at Blythe House Hospice, and their support means that we can spend the maximum amount of money directly on support and care for our patients and their families.

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What do we look for?

We want volunteers who are able to bring their life skills and experience to their role. Due to the nature of the work we do, our volunteers need to resonate with our values, be reliable, empathetic, have the highest level of integrity, commitment and an understanding of the need for strict confidentiality.

What do volunteers get out of it?

Our volunteers aren’t paid but their rewards include knowing that their support is appreciated by patients and staff, and that they are part of a team that makes a real difference to people in our community living with a life-limiting illness, or affected by bereavement.
Social benefits – with staff, fellow volunteers, customers and patients.
We also offer free, high quality training relevant to the volunteer role and the opportunity to learn new skills.

We have a range of volunteer opportunities for you to support us with, and we welcome anyone who is able, over the age of 18 (exceptions may be made for some supervised fundraising events, and for supervised student work placements):

Patient support services

Exciting opportunities for volunteers with a wide range of skills and talents are available at the Community Hub.

Please get in touch if you’re comfortable supporting people impacted by a life-limiting illness, and you’d enjoy a varied day. The role supports our patients, carers and staff by assisting with all aspects of our service delivery including, but not limited to, welcoming ‘visitors’ and make them comfortable, guide ‘visitors’ to where they need to be, provide companionship, provide practical support such as making drinks and supplying refreshments, and a range of other duties.

You would be offering practical and emotional support to patients, clients, family members and carers within Blythe House Hospice.

Fundraising

Blythe House Hospice is a charity that relies on 70% of its income through fundraising, including events, donations, regular giving and gifts lefts in wills. You could get involved in helping the hospice to raise these much-needed funds, to be able to provide free care and services to local people.

Fundraising volunteer roles include a range of opportunities, such as: assisting with the planning and organisation of events; manning stalls; distributing posters and leaflets across our local community; managing our collection pots, that raise over £10,000 per year in local businesses and other organisations; supporting our communications team with drafting content for social media, newsletters or appeals and so much more.

You could also support community fundraising, including meeting local people who wish to support the hospice, and saying thank you for their generosity, or perhaps you might like to help with administrative duties such as database inputting, and supporting our donor communications.

Retail activities

We have a range of retail volunteer opportunities including sorting, pricing, rotating and displaying our wonderful donated stock, and helping to serve and greet our customers.

We have five hospice charity shops located in Bakewell, Buxton, Chapel-en-le-Frith, New Mills and Whaley Bridge.

We also have opportunities for collections and delivery volunteer assistants at our Whaley Bridge department store; ideal for anyone who is happy to lift and shift items of furniture and help with collections and deliveries.

Admin

Our admin volunteer roles here at Blythe House Hospice include greeting our patients, carers, family members, public and staff, working with our care navigators by booking in appointments, taking telephone requests, helping with the reception shop, ad so much more.

We also have administrative duties such as database inputting, and supporting our donor communications.

This role would be within the hours of 9am-5pm, Monday to Friday, either on a routine, or ad-hoc basis.

Gardening

At Blythe House Hospice we have a garden that is used for our patients, carers, family members and our staff to take time and reflect on loved ones, a place to talk and reflect on memories.

We use our garden for special events for the hospice such as our Sunflower memories month, where the public can have a sunflower plaque, with their beloved name on in the garden throughout the month on June.

Our gardening volunteers help to maintain the garden, with planting, upkeep and overall care of the garden throughout the year.

Community volunteers

The Community Volunteer programme is designed to enhance and expand the support that Blythe House Hospice provides to our community, especially to patients wishing to be supported in their own home.

Community volunteers offer companionship, phone support, transportation, and respite breaks for patients, family members and carers.

This role is varied to meet patient/family needs. Requests can be for practical and/or emotional support. Tasks may include shopping, running errands, gardening, dog walking, or simply ‘being there’ so a carer can rest.

Trustee

Blythe House Hospice has a board of valued volunteer Trustee’s who strive to support the hospice with a range of responsibilities.

Our Trustee’s ensure that that the hospice continues to pursue it’s objectives as defined in its governing document and strategic plan, focus and overcome key issues, provide guidance on new initiatives, committed to the organisation, and so much more.

Please be aware of the following points:

To become a volunteer at Blythe House Hospice you need to be over 18 years old. Exceptions may be made for some supervised fundraising events, and for supervised student work placements.
We expect our volunteers to be willing to undertake any training required for their role.
Any Volunteer counsellors and complementary therapists must have recognised qualifications and the relevant experience, knowledge and skills required for their roles. Proof of professional qualifications is required. These roles also demand a firm time commitment.
Police checks are undertaken as required for some volunteer roles and all volunteers are required to provide two satisfactory references.
Given the sometimes difficult demands of volunteering both within, or connected to, a hospice environment, we strongly recommend that clients and former clients only consider volunteering after 12 months has passed since being discharged from our clinical or counselling services. Please refer to our policy on client support for Blythe House policy on client support for Blythe House for more details. However, there are other ways of supporting Blythe House, please contact us for details.

Interested in volunteering? We’d be very pleased to hear from you!

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Apply online to become a Blythe House Hospice volunteer

Apply now

Volunteer with Blythe House Hospice

What do we look for?

What do volunteers get out of it?

We have a range of volunteer opportunities for you to support us with, and we welcome anyone who is able, over the age of 18 (exceptions may be made for some supervised fundraising events, and for supervised student work placements):

Patient support services

Fundraising

Retail activities

Admin

Gardening

Community volunteers

Trustee

Please be aware of the following points:

Interested in volunteering? We’d be very pleased to hear from you!

Apply online to become a Blythe House Hospice volunteer

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Pauline’s volunteering story

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