A DARLINGTON hospice is using the latest technology to encourage people to make donations to help support its work.

People can now make a text donation to St Teresa's Hospice funds using their mobile telephone.

Anyone who would like to help the hospice can do so simply by sending the text message "LIFE" to the telephone number 80540.

That message will be charged at the normal rate and a message will be sent back costing the user £1.50.

At least 70p from this return message will be sent to the hospice.

Craig Linton, corporate fundraising manager at St Teresa's Hospice, said: "Although this may not seem a large amount, if every mobile phone user in the area made a donation this way we would raise a substantial amount of money.

"At this very important time of change and expansion for the hospice we need to make sure that many avenues of giving are open to make it as easy as possible for our very generous supporters to make a donation."

The hospice is preparing to open a full-time, six-bed care unit, which will work alongside its daytime care service.

The donation service is not available to Virgin mobile users.