WORTHING hospice St Barnabas House is appealing to its supporters to help buy new beds and pressure-relieving mattresses for its patients.

The hospice’s In-patient Unit consists of 20 beds, but ten are now more than 15 years old and desperately need replacing.

Sam Bennett, Ward Sister at St Barnabas House, said: “We’re fortunate here at St Barnabas to have a new, purpose built hospice building – and an amazing palliative (end-of-life) care nursing team.

“But, without the right environment and equipment, which is so vital to keep patients comfortable, there’s only so much any nursing team can achieve.

“We have 20 beds for our patients at St Barnabas and each bed is a combination of a motorised bed frame and a pressure-relieving mattress.

“But ten of these beds are now over 15 years old and desperately need replacing.

“We have a budget for the In-patient Unit of course, but we did not budget for all this equipment – we have to budget for the nursing costs first.

“So, we have to turn to our supporters and ask for your help.”

Each of the new beds the hospice requires will cost £2,700 with the ones which drop right to the floor costing £2,900.

The mattresses are £2,350 each and St Barnabas House is also in need of a double mattress for couples, which costs £2,480.

In total the hospice needs to raise £53,780 in the next few months to pay for the cost of the new beds and mattresses.

It costs more than £6 million each year to run the hospice and only 21 per cent of that amount is state-funded, meaning the majority has to be raised through voluntary donations from the local community in the Worthing, Adur, Arun and Henfield areas.

Go to www.stbh.org.uk/patient-comfort-appeal