Life Stories Volunteer Meeting
Life Stories Volunteer Meeting
Thursday, March 23rd 2023: 10.30 – 12.00 - Life Story Volunteer Meeting
Maria introduced herself and thanked everyone for their commitment and attendance today.
Group introductions – 12 volunteers present
Some statistical data and information shared with the group:
Currently there are 20 regular volunteers in life story
2021- 27 stories were compiled
2022- 15 stories were compiled
2023 to date there have been 12 referrals, eight of which have been actioned.
COVID had a big impact on the program.
Patients used to stay in the hospice for weeks/months. Now the average stay for a patient in the hospice is 8 days.
People chose to stay home to die and come to hospice at the very end and/or when in need of complex medical issues.
There are approx. 140 client in the community who are palliating.
Maria explained the funding from the Mary Potter Foundation; the life story coordinator vacancy – to date over 30 applicants received. Everyone agrees that this is an amazing program. The program embodies the mission and principles of Mary Potter and the hospital.
Feedback received - that the program has not been as responsive to the changing needs given length of stay at the Hospice. Consideration to also offer things such as letter writing, milestone events such as 21st, marriage of a child, pod casts, memory boxes etc. That these could be offered in addition to the traditional biography given the volunteers high level of skills & expertise.
Maria asked for feedback/discussions from the attending volunteers.
Volunteer Question:
How many social workers are there here? Answer; three social workers cover the Hospice and community patients.
How often do they receive visits from social workers? Answer: depends on their needs, but they are visited regularly.
Volunteer Comment:
What else can we do? Volunteers are empathetic toward patients’ needs and we understand the importance of what we do for the patients and we are responsive to what they want. It is not just a typing service nor a photo album book. It addresses the needs of the individual voice.
There was concern voiced that bringing audio and other types of technology can complicate things as extra equipment, skills are needed.
Need for additional training for the different technology and approaches.
Maria acknowledged and commended the volunteers’ highly skilled and responsive efforts and emphasized there was no doubt about the team’s skill set; there is a strong focus on how to continue to grow the program. There is no suggestion to cease the program in its current format. Rather that there will be more opportunities to do other things in addition to what is already being done.
Maria emphasised to please flag any concerns to her.
There probably will be more requests/referrals to write a letter rather than a book.
Maria briefly explained about the referral process, refreshing the brochure, the need to have ‘signed off’ by management and marketing and how to make it all happen.
Maria also explained the process for getting the program into the community more; Social workers are keen to offer the story book or something else (e.g. letter) where appropriate.
Volunteer comment:
There has been litter interaction with fellow story writers, very little feedback on how we are doing.
Meetings such as this especially when doing stories it is important to share what we have learned, to share experiences.
Not opposed to the idea of new things, but concern about how it is recorded.
The majority of the work is in editing, podcasts may be a bit better for some.
It is important to do matching to perhaps put a voice in as part of the story (someone suggested after recording the story to add a bit of a podcast to hear the voice)
Could also do a short video on the phone
Volunteer question:
How many donations are made toward the hospice? Volunteers often hear patients or family members say they will make one but the volunteers often do not hear any follow up or feedback. Maria to ask the Foundation.
Maria gave opportunity for volunteers to comment further by going around the room.
Comments:
In the past meetings were held every three months. This had ceased for some time. All present would like a regular meeting to occur again.
10.30 am is the preferred start time.
Mentors used to meet annually.
There used to be a monthly newsletter for the storytellers which was often just one page but an excellent way to communicate.
We seemed to have lost our cohesiveness without the regular newsletter and meetings.
More communication needed. Perhaps a group email to share. Used to be a Facebook but doesn’t get used.
Be good to have other’s emails.
In summary/action:
Regular meetings will recommence.
Communicate monthly such as through a newsletter
We will need everyone’s permission to give out their emails
We will look into group emails and Facebook.
Teams or zoom may be another way to communicate
For people to provide feedback on where their interests lie
Suggestion to invite Social Worker to one of the meetings.
Update/refresh brochure, Maria is working with marketing on this.
Maria expressed her thanks and gratitude for the groups’ skills and commitment; for it to keep growing and potentially include Calvary Central District Hospital
Maria also stated there is scope to engage a Social Work students to be involved in the program through evaluations.
Maria mentioned a request from a social worker: a person living in Magill who is socially isolated and would benefit from a regular visitor. If anyone is interested in this role, please advise Maria.
Meeting finished at 12.00
Meeting facilitated by Maria Reveruzzi
Notes taken by Jeannine Lampe
|  Mon, Mar 27, 2:49 PM (3 days ago) | | ||
| ||||
Hi All
A huge thanks to the 12 volunteers who attended last week’s meeting and to all the apologies received from volunteers unable to attend.
As agreed please see attached a summary of the key points discussed and questions asked. A huge thanks to Jeannine who kindly prepared the document. If there is anything important that has not been included, please feel free to provide feedback and I will amend the attached document.
To assist with making some decisions moving forward can I ask you all to respond to this email to the 5 questions highlighted below please:
Specific questions to the group (My answer in yellow highlight)
1. Please advise if you are in agreement for your email address to be shared with the group? Yes/No
2. Please advise how often you would like the group to meet? Monthly / Quarterly Any particular day of the week? (the general consensus was for meetings to start at 10.30 to allow time for people travelling long distances).
Quarterly, 10:30am Tuesday or Wednesday
3. Please advise which of following activities you are interested in being involved in: this can include training as well as help shape what the service could entail
o Biography recorder (for the moment)
o Mentor
o Writing letters
o Memory Box
o Pod Cast
o Assist with collating & preparing a regular Newsletter
o Any other activities relating to Biography Stories that you would like to be involved in?
4. If you have any other ideas that you would like to share, please feel free to include.
I suggested an electronic contact group, a group email, a Facebook group, or something else. Personally, for a beginner Life Story recorder who wants to ask questions to more experienced Life Story recorders, this may be more useful than a physical meeting which is for a different purpose.
5. I also mentioned that I had received a request from the social worker: re a person living in Magill who is socially isolated and would benefit from a regular visitor. If anyone is interested in this role, please advise so I can provide additional information.
Can I ask you all to respond to the questions above by Monday week- 3rd April, 2023. If you require more time, please do not hesitate to let me know.
As this is a small group of 20, it will be easy for me to collate the information and provide a summary to you all based on your responses to the above questions. I will aim to have a summary back to you by mid week.
Once again many thanks for your continued contribution.
With Gratitude
Maria
Maria Reveruzzi
Volunteer Program Manager
Calvary South Australia Office
207 Wakefield Street, Adelaide, SA, 5000
P: 08 8239 9100 | M: 0428 864 183
E: Maria.Reveruzzi@calvarycare.
www.calvarysa.org.au
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