Charity and Voluntary Sector
VSO: Dr Tom Bashford, 32, from London, recently won the Patient Safety Award from the Association of Anaesthetists of GB and Ireland, for his work promoting safe surgery while working as a VSO volunteer doctor in Ethiopia. He spoke recently of a ‘moral obligation’ to support developing countries with UK-trained medical professionals.
His role entailed sharing simple, life-saving skills & practices with the hospital team: setting up a High Dependency Unit; introducing the globally-recognised WHO Safe Surgery Checklist; and training staff to use life-saving equipment which had been donated but they did not know how to use. He left behind a team who had the skills to keep patients alive through surgery and crucially, who could train the next staff intake to do the same.
BHF: October is one of the busiest months of the year to move house, so why not donate your unwanted & reusable household goods to one of the British Heart Foundation’s Furniture & Electrical Stores, which operate a FREE collection service for your unwanted household goods, which can even be booked online.
HL: Recently, the Homelessness Transition Fund launched a new fund to help homelessness charities respond to pressures caused by rising demand at a time of cuts to funding. Under Future Ready, voluntary sector organisations that work with homeless people can apply for grants from £5,000 - £25,000 to help them respond to the challenges they face.
With homelessness numbers at their highest since 2008 and 6 out of every 10 projects having had their budgets cut in 2011, Future Ready aims to help organisations prepare for further changes to the commissioning and funding of services.
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