Welcome to the St Ann’s Hospice 2007/8 Impact Report in which we are proud to record another significant year in the work of St Ann’s Hospice.

Joint message from the chairman and the chief executive

This report sets out the achievements in each area of the Hospice in line with goals we set in 2007/8 and outlines the goals for 2008/9.

Good financial stewardship…
Although over £3.4 million of our income came in from NHS contributions, at the beginning of the financial year we still had to raise over £16,000 a day ourselves to meet our projected £9 million costs. Despite these challenges we ended the year in good financial health with an operating surplus of £741,485. This now provides St Ann’s Hospice with a strong position from which to begin the new financial year despite a deficit budget forecast of £715,770.

Campaigning and developing services…
Along with Cheadle Liberal Democrat MP, Mark Hunter, we recently led a delegation of cross-party MPs to meet Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Minister for Health, Ivan Lewis, over the issue of fairer funding for hospices. We since welcomed the introduction of England’s first End of Life Care Strategy for Adults and look forward to working with NHS colleagues to develop the best range of services for the people in our community living with life-threatening illnesses.

A leader in specialist palliative care…
Our role and reputation as a leader in the field of specialist palliative care continues to be reinforced. A ground-breaking initiative, the Integrated Admission Assessment Care Pathway for patients, devised by our staff, has been adapted and disseminated to hospices throughout the UK with many adopting the Pathway. Excellent research work has also been completed on the evaluation of the benefit to patients of complementary therapies. We are also currently developing the first dependency tool for specialist palliative care inpatient units.

We have both been appointed to sit on national committees: Terry as North West representative of the Help the Hospices Advisory Council – representing over 30 hospices – and Jean as Secretary of the Forum of Chairs of Independent Hospices. Key staff across the organisation also chair or sit on national and regional committees developing best practices in hospice services, benefiting patients and carers at St Ann’s Hospice and also across the country.

Medical expertise strengthened…
We are pleased to report the appointment of three further Consultants in Palliative Medicine. St Ann’s Hospice now has eight consultants who also have roles outside the Hospice involving supporting patients in local hospitals and in the community.

A special welcome…
A warm welcome goes to our new Director of Clinical Services, Esther Kirby, who brings with her a wealth of experience in palliative care for the benefit of our patients. We also welcome our new Vice President, the Lord Lieutenant of Greater Manchester, Warren Smith, as an influential ambassador for St Ann’s Hospice.

Capital improvements…
Following successful funding applications, we are proud to report that we have completed refurbishing reception areas at our Little Hulton site and at our Neil Cliffe Cancer Care Centre, and have installed piped oxygen at Little Hulton. These developments greatly improve access and services for our patients. Similar improvements at Heald Green are planned during the coming year once funding has been secured. We have also begun fundraising for essential improvements to Day Therapy facilities at the Little Hulton and Heald Green sites.

Voluntary income success…
Our first Manchester Midnight Walk in May 2007 has been our most successful fundraising initiative yet. Our chain of charity shops continues to expand – we opened our tenth outlet in December.

Finally, a huge ‘thank you’…
The care provided for our patients and their carers could not have been achieved without the loyal dedication of our staff which now numbers more than 300, together with our enthusiastic team of over 600 wonderful volunteers, to whom we are very grateful.

Likewise our thanks and gratitude goes out to our network of over 30,000 supporters, both locally and nationally, whom we rely on to allow our charity to continue providing free care and support for over 3,000 people each year.

Terry McDonnell, Chief Executive
Jean Jones, Chairman

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