We are urgently seeking acupuncture therapists to volunteer with our service at Grove House. Acupuncture forms part of the complementary therapy offering at our St Albans site and is a key part of offering truly holistic care to local patients and families impacted by life-limiting illnesses.
Qualified acupuncture therapy professionals are needed to join our complementary therapist workforce, as the acupuncture service is currently on hold.
Marion Richardson from St Albans volunteered as a complementary therapist at Grove House for over 14 years. She explains:
“When I first trained as a medical acupuncturist, I was keen to combine my new-found knowledge and skills with voluntary work. I knew that acupuncture could be very helpful in a number of conditions and symptoms that Grove House patients would be experiencing and so this was a way of expanding my experience and helping with the care of this group of clients.”
She continues:
“I enjoyed meeting the patients and adding another therapy into their treatment mix. There were sad times, of course, but mostly I got to see patients improving and getting better as they ran through their course of treatments with me.
“It was always a joy to be able to relieve some symptoms, to help patients to feel more positive and to get to know them better. Every encounter was a special time for me.”
After almost a decade and a half of voluntary service Marion stepped down from her role to focus on other areas of her life, leaving an opening for other qualified acupuncturists to volunteer their time to support local patients and families in this way.
Fenella Campa, Volunteer Development Advisor at Rennie Grove Peace Hospice Care, says:
“Our complementary therapy volunteers play a huge part in the delivery of holistic care to our patients. They often tell us that they, too, get so much out of volunteering. Whether that’s in terms of professional experience, personal fulfilment or the joy of working as part of a wider team that makes a huge difference to people’s lives.”