Our meeting was attended by 29 in person and by Zoom plus our guest speaker, Sandy Barnes, the Executive Director of Hospice Prince Edward.
Hospice Prince Edward is a charitable organization that provides quality of life, dignity in death and grief and bereavement support for all those living with a life-limiting illness.
Sandy emphasized that the recent change to the nursing staff that is now hired by Hospice rather than being provided by an outside agency, provides a continuity of care that was not possible when the nurses and PSW’s provided by the agency could change day-to-day.
In addition to the three-bed hospice that is in a home-setting in Picton, Sandy described the community support provided by Hospice volunteers who would travel to people’s homes to provide respite care and counselling to the families. She hoped to find volunteers in Wellington to expand this service to our area.
The description of the services showed benefits that could be provided when a diagnosis of a terminal illness is learned, not just at the last of a person’s life. Please call her when Hospice can help with home care and grief counselling, too.
Club Business
Trudy expects to have information on Family Day activities next week, especially on our usual preparation and serving of soups.
Congratulations to Christine on the 4-page supplement in the Wellington Times advertising our 20th year celebration.
A motion was made by John Inwood, seconded by Lana, that Dick MacArthur be remembered with a plaque at the Memorial Garden. There was unanimous support for his inclusion even though he had not been a member for the last 18 months. However, Phyo pointed out that this was not provided for in the currently established eligibility guidelines for the Memorial Garden, and that the Board should be tasked to deliberate on this topic and make recommendations to amend the guidelines. There was a ground-swell of support for a change to allow Dick to be remembered this way because of all his great work for the Club in so many areas. John Inwood withdrew his motion to allow the Board to consider amendments to the by-law or guidelines at the next Board meeting.
Liz had the winning ticket for the 50:50 draw, but Margo, drawing on her behalf, did not choose the ace of spades.