St Joseph’s Carers Service is looking for new volunteers to help support unpaid family carers in East London.
Our Carers Service volunteers support relatives and friends of our patients by providing companionship and emotional support.
The service offers free respite for unpaid family carers in the community, where a volunteer will sit with the patient for a few hours providing companionship, while their carer has a break. Our volunteers also provide emotional support for unpaid carers, helping to reduce isolation.
St Joseph’s celebrates the diversity of its local communities and actively welcomes applications from volunteers who reflect this diversity, as well as those who speak locally-spoken languages.
While not essential for the role, we are also particularly interested in hearing from people who have personally experienced caring for a loved one.
Unpaid Carers face challenges in their roles sometimes and it can go unnoticed the huge contribution they provide to supporting families in the UK.
The carers role supports those unsung heroes who are always supporting others tasks include the following:
- To meet with your service users on a regular basis on mutually agreed dates/times.
- To provide emotional support and companionship to patients and carers when visiting. This may include tasks such as listening, talking and reading.
- Carer respite: to sit with and provide companionship to the patient (between 1 -4 hours) to enable the carer to take a break, do some shopping, attend a support group, meet up with friends or family, or attend their own heath appointments.
- Develop an awareness of other services and resources available for carers at the hospice and local community. To be alert to and identify those needing in -depth support or additional services, and report this to the Carer Service Coordinator as appropriate._.
- To perform light tasks, this may include preparing drinks or snacks, washing a few dishes, collecting prescriptions etc.
- To offer telephone support/befriending to carers. Complete and submit professional visit records in a timely manner.
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One day of Volunteer services training
Time commitment
Roles are available during the week during office hours.