What is a…: Hospice Paramedic?
Hospice in the Weald began hiring paramedics in autumn of 2018 to meet the community's pressing hospice palliative care needs. As a result, paramedics have had their role extended to hospice settings and have become specialist palliative care providers for our end-of-life care patients. Employing hospice paramedics helps boost our clinical staff numbers to meet the growing needs of an ageing population.
Paramedics work across all of our clinical services, including hospice outreach, cottage hospice and inpatient ward. Currently, we have 12 paramedics working across these services, five of which are bank staff. This article presents the on-the-job role and experiences of two paramedics who are working in our hospice outreach service.
Vicki Fuller has worked with the hospice for 3 years, first as a paramedic and now as a clinical paramedic specialist. Vicki provides insight into how she came to working in a hospice:
‘I began my career in paramedicine as an ambulance paramedic. I did not enjoy the unsocial hours of ambulance paramedicine, so I made a change and started working as an accident and emergency (A&E) hospital paramedic liaison officer. This was a novel role for paramedics that gave me experience in acute care. This gave me the confidence to take advantage of another opportunity that came my way: being a community paramedic tasked with reducing hospital admissions. While working as a community paramedic, I developed my experience in palliative care and enjoyed it very much. I decided to specialise in palliative care when this job post opened at the hospice in 2018.
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