"An enormous sense of comfort at a very difficult time"

Anne, the community matron supported us to navigate through a decline in health of my mother-in-law through Parkinson’s over the last year or so. Anne anticipated her care needs and worked with many stakeholders and services to secure the best possible care in a timely, caring and professional way.

Anne always put the wishes and needs of our loved one first and gave them and us as her carers a voice and a path through the challenging months before her eventual passing in December. Anne took time to get to know our loved one, building a relationship with her, the carers and our family. This allowed her to understand patient need and advocate for this and it built a very high level of trust for us all.

We felt so supported throughout, we didn’t even know what we needed or what was available and Anne was able to gently work through what was ahead and ensure documentation, drugs, support services were aligned. This relieved a huge stress on us as a busy family, we were prepared for next steps and when the end came it was exactly as our loved one wanted - to be at home and in no pain. This brought an enormous sense of comfort at a very difficult time.

Our loved one had clear wishes not to go into hospital and not to prolong suffering and the community matron worked with us to the end that this could be respected. We would not have been able to achieve this without the incredible community support offered and coordinated by our matron, Anne.

We genuinely felt safe, informed and guided throughout. We will always feel very thankful for the service provided to our family - it meant everything to us and continues to give us peace that everything possible was done to support a loved one in their last days.