Christmas Donation

We protect, support and nurture the UK's most vulnerable children

We help hundreds of thousands of children, young people, parents and carers via our 800+ services across the UK.

We help children through the trauma of sexual abuse and exploitation.

We provide support for young people in care – and we don’t forget about them when they leave the care system.

We give children caring for a loved one the help and support they deserve.

And that’s not all. Our specialist workers support families through domestic abuse, mental health problems, prison sentences, asylum seeking and much more.

We also amplify the voices of young people to influence Government on the issues that affect their lives, fighting their corner and making sure their voices are heard.

The scale of what we do may be big and complex, but our aim is simple – to provide the best outcome for every child, no matter who they are or what they have been through.

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CW+ is the official charity of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Our generous supporters and partners enable us to:

• Build and enhance clinical facilities to create an outstanding healing environment for patients and staff
• Deliver a unique art and design programme to transform the experience and wellbeing of our patients
• Invest in health innovation to deliver exceptional patient care

We support our paediatric patients and their families in a variety of ways and I have listed just a few of these that might inspire your clients to donate:

Critical Care Campaign

We are redeveloping our critical care units to meet the growing number of adults and critically ill babies who need our care. Phase 1 and 2 of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit is now complete and when it opens next year, the unit will have increased from 37 to 42 cots, have a 40% bigger footprint affording more space and privacy between cots, have more family facilities including meeting rooms, an expressing room and two overnight stay rooms. Whilst we have raised the £12.5m needed to help fund the overall redevelopment costs, there are items of equipment that would still be appreciated and other enhancements such as artworks, that will help create a calming, welcoming environment.

Supporting virtual family visits in Paediatrics

We have funded a secure messaging system called vCreate in both the Neonatal Unit and Special Care Baby Units at the Trust. This enables staff to record films of babies and send them securely to parents/carers who can then share with others. The technology has since developed further, enabling families to send their own messages in. With strict visiting restrictions now in place and set to continue over Christmas, we are looking to roll out this system across paediatric wards. In order to do this, each ward must have access to at least one tablet and we are therefore seeking donations to help us fund the purchase of these and the vCreate subscription costs. The ipads alone can also be used to facilitate face time visits for families, which is particularly important to those who do not live locally.

CW+ MediCinema

We have our own state of the art cinema, located on the third floor of the hospital. It has 40 seats and space for wheelchairs and beds. Nurses are in attendance at all times and with support from the film industry and our delivery partner MediCinema, patients and their families get to enjoy the latest film releases, free of charge. We usually run two screenings for children every week with Friday’s reserved for special screenings (usually for one patient who cannot attend regular screenings). We are currently operating socially distanced screenings and are working with Hospedia to screen films at patients’ bedsides during this time. The CW+ MediCinema is funded completely by charitable donations.

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• Grief Encounter is one of the UK’s leading child bereavement charities that is determined to reach out and be there so that no one has to be alone in their grief. An astonishing 1 in 29 children in the UK under 16 years old will suffer the death of a parent. Bereavement is devastating at any age, but for a child it is beyond tragic and truly unimaginable.
• The charity provides pioneering services and support to bereaved children and their families. Their mission is to ensure that every bereaved child and their family in the UK receives the best quality information, advice and counselling to help alleviate the pain caused by the death of a loved one.
• Counselling children in London, but also in Bristol and Essex, they also have a national reach through their helpline ‘grieftalk’, and ‘Grief Relief Kits’ are posted to children and young people who are trying to adjust to the death of a family member.
• The charity relies 100% on voluntary donations. Fundraising is more of a challenge than ever before and they must urgently find ways to plug a huge deficit due to cancelled fundraising events. This puts the work they do at great risk.

In 2019/2020, Grief Encounter:

• delivered 5,661 counselling sessions at our clinical centre and post lockdown, via e-counselling
• posted out 638 Grief Relief Kits and Grief Encounter Workbooks to support hundreds of grieving individuals and families across the UK
• received 3,025 calls, webchats and emails via grieftalk
• supported 267 families on our family programme – 175 were new families to us that year
• And much, much more…

Covid-19

• Last year communications to Grief Encounter’s helpline ‘grieftalk’ increased by 97%.
• Anxiety levels of vulnerable bereaved children are at all-time high. Having already experienced the death of one parent, the fear of their remaining parent or a grandparent catching this deadly virus can be overwhelming for them.
• Grief Encounter’s 84 counsellors are working harder than ever, from their own homes, to be there for all our families, supporting them in the best way possible in these unprecedented times.
• ‘Grief Relief Kits’ include a workbook, activities and other resources that enable family members to begin to talk about and process their tragic loss together which can then be transformed into special memory boxes.
• A gift of £3,000 could pay for 30 Kits for bereaved children in need of support this Christmas time.

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Make-A-Wish UK exists to make wishes come true every day, for the children who need them the most. The positive impact it has on them and their families is profound. We are incredibly proud that since 1986, we have granted more than 14,000 wonderful wishes for poorly children from all over the UK.

In 2017, George was diagnosed with Batten disease, a degenerative genetic condition that meant his life would be cruelly cut short. His family wanted to make the most of every day that they had left with him.

At Make-A-Wish we try to make the impossible a reality. And we granted George’s wish to go tobogganing down the side of a mountain in Austria. He spoke for the first time in 18 months during that thrilling moment!

Just over a year after his wish was granted, George sadly passed away. But his wish meant that George’s family could have an experience which was truly like no other - and make memories to cherish forever.

See the magical moment of George on his wish here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaLwF8gTlWI.

We currently have around 2,000 children waiting for their wish due to the impact of Covid-19. Please consider supporting Make-A-Wish UK this year, and you will help us to create more life-changing wishes for children like George and his family.

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