St Richard's Hospice

Updated 10 February 2025

St Richard's Hospice is a purpose built hospice. The hospice provides care and treatment to patients over the age of 18 with life limiting conditions who require specialist palliative and end of life care. The service also provides support to patients’ loved ones and bereaved people in Worcestershire. The service aims to improve patients' quality of life from diagnosis, during treatment and throughout their last days. The service also supports people important to patients.

As an independent registered charity, St Richard's Hospice relies on donations and gifts in wills for most of its income with the remainder (20%) funded by the NHS.

The hospice provides both inpatient and community care which includes outpatient support, advice and treatment. There is a dedicated telephone helpline available Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm, calls outside this time are forwarded to the inpatient unit. The community specialist end of life and palliative care is divided into 4 community teams and a rapid response team (this team respond to urgent referrals across all areas) in South Worcestershire. In addition, there is an onsite living well service supporting patients with life limiting conditions to live independently in their own homes and community. This aspect of the service includes providing education and information. It empowers patients and their loved ones to engage in difficult conversations about death and dying. It also supports advance care planning. The service offers peer support sessions. There is nurse-led face-to-face and telephone support. It also provides alternative therapies and counselling services. Additionally, there are small group activities. Examples include art and gardening.

The in-patient unit is purpose built and can accommodate up to 17 patients in single occupancy ensuite rooms. The service has facilities which include dedicated family suites, wellbeing café with large communal area/ dining area, treatment rooms and private meeting rooms.

Staff include a team of doctors, nurses, health care assistants, specialist nurses, allied health professionals, including specialist palliative care social workers, counsellors, spiritual care leads, occupational therapists and physiotherapists. Qualified nurses and health care assistants deliver care on site 24 hours a day. Between March 2024 and February 2025, the hospice provided support to 1933 patients: 295 on the inpatient unit and 1638 patients in the community or as outpatients.

St Richard’s Hospice has been registered with the CQC since January 2011. St Richard's Hospice is registered to provide the following regulated activities: Treatment of disease, disorder or injury. There has been a registered manager in post since 2019.

This was a comprehensive unannounced (the hospice did not know we were coming) assessment of St Richard's Hospice. The onsite assessment was undertaken on the 18 March 2025. One CQC inspector, a specialist advisor and an expert by experience were onsite and supported by an operational manager offsite. The onsite visit was followed by staff and manager interviews, attendance of a multi-disciplinary meeting and review of information requested by CQC and sent to us by the hospice. We spoke with 23 members of staff (including managers, nurses, nursing assistants, therapists, a social worker, administrative staff and volunteers. We spoke with 10 patients, 7 relatives and carers and reviewed 5 sets of patient notes. We reviewed 5 staff files and 1 volunteer file.

Updated 10 February 2025

St Richard’s Hospice provided advice, support and, when required, treatment to patients following their life limiting diagnosis. This took place within patients’ own home, as an outpatient, attendance at wellbeing sessions or within the inpatient unit.Patients and their loved ones all provided positive feedback about St Richard's Hospice as part of a continuous service user evaluation. The results from the evaluation from October 2024 to March 2025 identified 99% of people rated the service as either excellent or good.The service listened to, acted upon feedback, and worked closely with network partners and patient groups to improve and tailor services for everyone.

Patients and their loved ones could access advice, support and be signposted when required to other services for example social or financial support. Patients were able to self-refer to the hospice whose aim was to provide a more flexible approach to hospice care. The service enabled patients to see what the service could offer and for them to engage at their own pace.

Patients and their loved ones told us St Richard’s Hospice provided a caring and responsive service. They said there were sufficient staff who were exceptionally caring and kind, provided information and supported them to make informed choices.

Patients and their loved ones said staff worked in partnership with other teams to meet their needs. People said: “They answered my questions even the difficult ones.” “They have totally surpassed all my expectations; and “They are supporting my (loved one) and that is important to me.”