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Someone Cares

Chaplains

Info for churches

NHS Chaplaincy Guidelines state that “hospital chaplains are tasked with promoting pastoral, spiritual and religious well being through skilled compassionate person-centred care for patients and other people within hospital communities”.

Given the level of need, Someone Cares recognises that no matter how hard a hospital chaplaincy team works, there is always more that could be done to support the needs of patients, their families and the wider hospital community. We believe that chaplains should not be left to the task of caring for the needs of those in hospitals, but that the local church has the opportunity, and also the responsibility, to support this vital work. 

This is because hospitals are focal points of need in our communities. In recent years there has been a sharp increase in church-based support in other areas of community need; such as food poverty, financial poverty, and homelessness.

What if the local church could offer similar support into hospitals through supporting the work of chaplaincy services?

The heart of Someone Cares is to bring hope into hospitals. We link a local church to their local hospital chaplaincy service with the aim of helping to provide emotional, practical, and spiritual support to patients, their families, and the wider hospital community.

In addition to recruiting your own volunteers, working with a local church through a Someone Cares project would provide your chaplaincy service with the following:

More volunteers

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Practical resources

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Services promotion

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Community support links

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Resource toolbox

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Prayer support

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"The link between Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust and Freedom Church, through Someone Cares, has been an amazing blessing to our patients, families and staff alike. The practical benefits of care packs and children's pyjamas are so much needed and appreciated whilst the spiritual and social benefits of prayer and visits from volunteers have enabled the work of the Spiritual Care team to reach out to service users and staff who might otherwise have slipped 'under our radar'."

Rev David Williams, Spiritual Care Manager, Alder Hey Children’s Hospital

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If you would like to know more about bringing hope into your own local hospital through running a Someone Cares project then please get in touch for an informal chat. We would love to hear from you!

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Someone Cares is a part of Freedom Church Liverpool, registered charity, no. 1161463
Designed and made by Mark Swadkins

Volunteers

Volunteers working within your team – Our aim through Someone Cares is to promote hospital chaplaincy volunteering as a valuable role and to bolster your already existing volunteer numbers. Any volunteers who come to the role through Someone Cares would be fully incorporated into your existing team and would come under your leadership in the same way as any other chaplaincy volunteer.  

Understanding the role – It is important to note that although Someone Cares is a church-based project we recognise that chaplaincy encompasses care and support for individuals of all religions and beliefs (including none) without discrimination. You can be reassured that we expect Someone Cares volunteers to adhere to the NHS Chaplaincy guidelines and to care for those of all faiths and beliefs equally.

Training – We are committed to ensuring that Someone Cares volunteers come to you well-equipped for the hospital chaplaincy volunteer role. In addition to your hospital trust’s recruitment process, they will undertake our Someone Cares volunteer initial training. This includes information on what hospital chaplaincy is (and isn’t) plus the relevant guidelines in place. The training also includes guidance on how to have pastoral conversations about difficult situations and how to look after your own emotional wellbeing in this worthwhile but challenging role. We will ensure that you have access to the content of this training should you want it.

Ongoing volunteer support – Someone Cares volunteers will be required to attend ongoing regular training and support sessions through Someone Cares. Some of these will be provided regionally online and church-based Someone Cares teams will also be expected to provide a number of local team sessions too (with guidance). Someone Cares will also ensure that volunteers are kept up to date with national hospital chaplaincy news, developments and further training opportunities.

Practical resources

We encourage churches running Someone Cares projects to fund and provide practical items that show care to patients going through difficult circumstances. An example is emergency toiletry packs at the point of admission for patients who have no alternative access to these items at the time.

Hospitals may also request particular items and we will work with projects to help set up systems to deliver these. For example, the Someone Cares project into Alder Hey Children’s Hospital was asked to provide good quality donated children’s pyjamas for use in A&E. The link church now gathers pyjama donations within the local community and volunteers within the congregation iron, package and label these before dropping them off at the hospital.

Promoting hospital chaplaincy services

Practical items provided by Someone Cares projects will contain a leaflet, written in conjunction with yourselves, detailing the chaplaincy support available at the hospital plus contact details for the chaplaincy team. This provides an important link with chaplaincy services, often at the point of admission to hospital.

An increase in your volunteer numbers will also increase the visibility of chaplaincy within the hospital trust to patients and staff alike.

Linking into church-based community support for your patients

Churches are now considered an essential part of the provision of community support services and do amazing work in many areas. Churches in your local area most likely run projects that would benefit some of your patients once they are discharged home: for example community cafes, befriending programmes and food banks. 

It is our hope that through the involvement of a local church, the support of Someone Cares will continue after discharge for those who would appreciate that. Involving a local church in your chaplaincy provision increases your knowledge of, and links to, church-based support services that you can signpost patients to. Pastoral relationships with volunteers may also have the opportunity to continue through the supporting church once patients are home, easing the transition back into the community and combating issues such as loneliness. 

We have also seen church-based support be made available to patients whilst still in hospital through Someone Cares. One project was able to offer debt advice services to families on the wards, easing some of the stress caused by the financial pressures that prolonged ill health can bring. 

Access to the skills and resources of the whole church congregation

An expectation of a Someone Cares project is that the whole church will get involved. Only a handful of church members will be able to carry out regular pastoral visiting as chaplaincy volunteers; however, the link between your service and a local church means that the church can act like a toolbox full of skills and resources to support your service.

How this works will be between yourself and the church that runs the Someone Cares project, but the possibilities are endless. We have had churches provide everything from graphic design to debt advice to man power for laminating large numbers of posters!

Prayer support

Prayer underpins all of Someone Cares.

We love for our volunteers to pray at the bedside of those who request it in hospital. We also expect the church running a Someone Cares project to commit to praying for their local church, chaplains, patients and the wider hospital community. These can be general prayers but we also encourage Someone Cares projects to set up prayer networks for specific prayer requests from patients and chaplains.

We believe in a God who loves us and wants the best for us. A God who draws alongside those who are hurting, and who ‘heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds’ (Psalm 147:3).

It is important to note that although we believe in a God who has the power to heal, we do not view Someone Cares as a healing ministry nor as an evangelistic ministry. It is a ministry of getting alongside individuals, walking a difficult path with them and bringing God’s love into their situation. Sometimes this involves prayer and sometimes it does not. If individuals request prayer, volunteers are encouraged to ask what they would specifically like prayer for, and to pray for that, plus God’s peace and presence in their situation. We also ensure that volunteers are aware that they need to work within the parameters set by their lead chaplain regarding praying with individuals.

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