Fiona Young from CHAS - Children's Hospices Across Scotland

Fiona Young, East of Scotland fundraiser for Children’s Hospices Across Scotland (CHAS), gave a presentation on the charity’s new £20 million appeal. The appeal, to be launched later this month, is aiming to “help transform children’s hospice care in Scotland.”

CHAS has two main 8-bed units at Rachel House, Kinross, and Robin House at Balloch. Money raised from the appeal will go towards rebuilding Rachel House (£17m), renovating Robin House (£3m) and reorganising the CHAS at Home service (£1m) which provides end of life care at people’s family homes. Fiona said the aim was to provide choice for families for children’s palliative care.

Over the last 30 years since Rachel House opened in 1996 medical advances meant children were living longer and they were dealing with more complex conditions. The plans for the expanded Rachel House included a new hydrotherapy pool, piped oxygen to rooms and better accommodation for parents with family suites.

The Rachel House building project will begin in September with the aim to finish in December 2027. With the building closed, the hospice will have a temporary move to ex-nursing home Mina House in Kinglassie. Money will also be used for a new clinical advisory service, expanded end-of-life nursing care and for developing care in hospitals in Aberdeen, Glasgow, Dundee and Dumfries.

Answering questions, Fiona said that it costs £24 million a year to run CHAS services and that about £7 million comes from the government. Running costs have risen by more than 40% in the last decade.

President David Gray introduced Fiona and Carol Morris proposed thanks for Fiona’s excellent presentation.