Our Services
One of the first professionals from the Hospice a patient will meet will be one of our Community Nurse Specialists.
Community Nurse Specialist Team (CNS)
- The CNS team offer community visits to all patients referred (and accepted) to the hospice services for community intervention.
- They work within geographical areas and have named staff allocated to specific GP practices.
- Each team member has considerable experience alongside specialist qualifications and training to deliver specialist palliative care advice and support.
- The CNS team works very closely with the Primary Health Care Teams (GPs and District Nurses) as well as the acute hospital palliative care teams (e.g. at UBHT) to provide on-going, seamless support for patients and carers.
- The CNS team aim to enhance the quality of life of all patients by offering symptom control, psychological support, family support, close liaison and support to the GP and DN teams and (if wanted) education.
- The CNS team work very closely with the wider hospice teams to ensure that all levels of hospice services are utilised appropriately to meet the patient’s needs. They meet each week with one of our consultants to talk through their patients and identify further input that might be helpful. Our CNS’s are often asked if they are MacMillan Nurses. The simple answer is ‘no’ as we do not receive funding from MacMillan, or any other charity, but they do exactly the same job.
More information
Learn more about how we care in the communiy by reading about our Hospice at Home service.