Here is the story of Simon, a volunteer at CUH.
I’m privileged to be a ward volunteer at Cambridge University Hospitals, visiting patients, talking to them and hopefully cheering them up. I have volunteered since 2019 on wards for the elderly, on the dialysis unit and am currently on wards for oncology and neurology. Patients are all different, but most want a friendly chat and the occasional laugh. I have 2-hour shifts on two mornings a week including handing out lunch.
During the height of the Covid pandemic we weren’t allowed to volunteer on the hospital site, and instead I acted as a traffic marshal on drive-through testing stations for Covid and for blood tests – outdoors in all types of weather. I also mentor new volunteers, and the 16 to 19-year-olds from the young people’s programme who want an insight into what work on hospital wards is like.
My motivation lies partly in my experience of having been a patient at the hospital, so ‘giving back’ is important to me.
More importantly, I take inspiration from the amazing patients that I meet through my role. I’m also hugely impressed by what I see of the commitment and technical skills of nurses and staff. I have never before encountered such a highly skilled, technologically complex and caring environment, and one which is currently very pressured. I’m impressed by the hospital management, and its dedication to ensuring that CUH remains one of the leading biomedical campuses in Western Europe.
As volunteers we try our best to support patients – we of course can’t undertake any staff roles. We offer something different – ‘a hint of home’, a reminder of the world outside that the patients are so keen to get back to. There are a number of volunteer roles; ward volunteers, marshals, those who guide patients and visitors on arrival or do patient surveys, and others who manage the wheelchairs around the hospital.
We are well supported by the CUH voluntary services team. I’m a member of the CUH Arts Committee which supports the use of expressive arts of all kinds to help humanise the hospital environment for patients, visitors and staff. It has input to the design of two of CUH’s priority projects – the new Children’s Hospital, which will be a very child-friendly and colourful building, and to the new Cancer hospital.
CUH is a centre for excellence locally, regionally and internationally. It provides acute care, acts as a major research centre and as a leading teaching hospital. It’s quite simply the best. As volunteers we get the chance to play a tiny role in the way this magnificent hospital cares for patients, something as an Arts graduate I would not have expected. Volunteering for CUH is hugely worthwhile and I would unreservedly recommend it.