A HOSPICE has highlighted its record of helping people achieve their dying wish of spending their last days at home.

Butterwick Hospice chiefs have spoken out amid national concerns about the relatively small number of terminally- ill people who are able to pass away in familiar surroundings with their loved ones at hand.

According to a recent National Audit Office (NAO) report, only a third of people spend their last days at home – despite almost three quarters saying they want to.

However, bosses at Butterwick Hospice, which runs adults hospices in Bishop Auckland and Stockton, as well as a children’s hospice in Stockton, say 70 per cent of their patients who express a wish to, are able to spend their last days at home.

Graham Leggatt-Chidgey, chief executive of Butterwick Hospice Care, said: “The NAO report demonstrates the national disparity between the wishes of most of us to die at home with our loved ones and in familiar surroundings and the reality that only 35 per cent of those dying each year actually achieve what really has to be a basic human right.

“One of the many services provided by Butterwick Hospice directly addresses this problem to considerable effect.”

He said the Butterwick outof- hours service in the Stockton borough cares for about 300 patients each year.

The service costs £250,000 a year to run, of which £175,000 is provided by Stockton Primary Care Trust, with the hospice funding the balance from charitable donations.

The service provides support for patients and their families in their own homes.

It is provided by palliative care nurses and healthcare assistants employed by the hospice.

Mr Leggatt-Chidgey said the service was described in an evaluation by the University of Teesside as “a positive addition to the range of services provided to palliative care patients in the North Tees locality”.

He added: “The evaluation highlighted that patients and carers were reassured overnight when they felt most vulnerable.

“This is a good example of what can be achieved by charitable hospices and the local NHS working in partnership.

“It demonstrates that not only can patient care be improved, but additionally expensive hospital services are not being used unnecessarily on inappropriate admissions.”