We’re delighted to announce that in 2022, the St Gemma’s Hospice Winter Ball will be celebrating its 20th anniversary! Themed around the classic 20th anniversary gemstone, this years’ Emerald Ball will be held at Elland Road’s Centenary Pavilion on Saturday 19^th November 2022.

Raising vital funds for St Gemma’s Hospice, the Emerald Ball begins with a sparking drinks reception, followed by an evening of entertainment and exquisite food, including our traditional raffle and auctions, plus your chance to win £20,000 just in time for Christmas!

Over the past twenty years, the Winter Ball has raised over £600,000 for the Hospice, and we would love for you to join us on 19^th November, both to celebrate the last twenty years and to look forward to many more.

Tickets are now available to purchase here with two packages – standard tables or our special Emerald Tables – available for you to purchase. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with the team on events@st-gemma.co.uk or 0113 218 5505.

We’d like to thank everyone who has developed and worked on this event over the last twenty years, helping to solidify the Ball as an annual feature of the St Gemma’s Hospice events calendar. We’d particularly like to thank Malcolm Moss for his dedication and support of St Gemma’s Hospice, and thank the current and previous members of the Income Generation team at St Gemma’s who have invested time and energy into creating an incredible event.

Jon is running the London Marathon this autumn in memory of his wife Kelly who was looked after by St Gemma’s community team. Jon has shared his story with us…

My wife Kelly was diagnosed with cancer in early 2019. Despite an early diagnosis, two major operations and multiple sessions of chemotherapy / radiotherapy nothing would hold the cancer back. By mid-2021 the cancer had spread extensively and we received the devastating news that Kelly had very little time left. From early in Kelly’s treatment, we received support from St. Gemma’s community nursing team to assist in bringing all elements of her care together. Latterly we received extensive support from the community medical and nursing teams to allow Kelly to remain at home for as long as possible. St Gemma’s became the corner stone of Kelly’s care, linking the support from GPs, district nurses and the hospital. In the end Kelly spent her final few hours at the Hospice to make her as comfortable as possible.

As Kelly’s situation worsened, I had to spend more time at home to be on hand to help Kelly whenever needed. Where possible I would take time out to go for a run for 30 minutes or so each day to clear my head.

After Kelly passed away, I was speaking with one of our friends who had entered the 2022 London Marathon to raise money for another cancer charity. Out of curiosity I checked the London Marathon website to see if St Gemma’s had allocated spaces for fundraisers in 2022. They did and I entered the ballot at St. Gemma’s on the spur of the moment. I was shocked when I received the news that I was in. I ran the Great North Run back in 2003 when I was much younger, but I have never attempted anything like this before.

Throughout Kelly’s treatment she never gave up and always showed tremendous courage. By entering the London Marathon in memory of Kelly I hope that I can harness some of her strength and raise as much money as possible for St Gemma’s.

St. Gemma’s were always there to provide the most amazing support for Kelly. Without their help we would have been lost. We feel that it is incredibly important that we now assist St. Gemma’s to continue to support other families in their time of need.

The counselling that my step daughter Kimberley and I continue to receive since we lost Kelly has been significant in helping us to start to put our lives back together. Anything we can do to raise funds for St. Gemma’s is our way of thanking them for looking after our family.

I would like to also make a special mention to Neil Hamer, Paul Berwin and Andy Thompson for taking an active role in driving me on with the marathon training. I cannot thank them enough for getting me out there and inspiring me to keep going. They play a huge part in motivating me, particularly on the days when I am struggling.

Finally, another special mention for Kelly’s daughter Kimberley and for Kelly’s mum Jan for their efforts in organising the fundraising side of things. We have already received tremendous support from so many people and if anyone else would like to sponsor me then our St Gemma’s fundraising page can be found at www.justgiving.com/Jon-Hardie-Jackson

When the national lockdown was announced in March 2020, we had to close all of our charity shops overnight. As people had to stay at home and high street shops were closed, many took the opportunity to declutter and have a sort out. As the weeks went by we received increasing numbers of enquiries asking when we’d be taking donations for our shops again. At that point we had two options; we could do what many other charities did and let people know that we didn’t have the space or resources to manage so many donations, or we could pull out all of the stops, find new space and get extra help. In true St Gemma’s fashion, we decided on the latter!

Our retail team worked together to decide how we could manage collections and donations safely and efficiently. And in anticipation of the retail sector reopening in July, we launched our new online collection service in June. We invited the community to book a slot to have their kind donations of clothing, furniture and bric-a-brac collected from their homes. We also launched a ‘drive & drop’ service encouraging donors to drop off their items at our sorting warehouse in Bramley.

I think it is fair to say that the response from the public was phenomenal! We knew the service would be popular but we didn’t realise quite how many requests we were going to get. Our phones were ringing off the hook as hundreds of generous supporters flooded to donate their preloved items to us. It really was all hands on deck as our fundraising team, who weren’t able to manage any of their usual summer events, pitched in and helped to answer all of the calls and emails that kept flooding in. They quickly worked out systems to arrange home collections, manage the influx of amazing incoming stock and recruit more volunteers to support this mammoth operation. It was a fantastic team effort.

As our warehouse filled to the brim, and demand for collections was still very high, we decided to source some storage units across the city to help manage the stock. One after another will filled those too and eventually ended up with over 20 units full of amazing, high-quality stock. In fact, it has taken a whole team of volunteers nearly two years to sort through all the donations and prepare them for sale.

It is only thanks to your generous donations and an amazing, determined team effort that we successfully and safely managed to reopen all of our shops after that lockdown, and another two lockdowns after that!

This Saturday (12 February 2022) we are absolutely delighted to be opening our brand new charity superstore in Meanwood, opposite Waitrose. It’s our biggest shop yet, over 4,000 sq. ft., and thanks to our amazing community of Leeds, it will be packed full of the most incredible, quality items, many of which were donated back in the very busy summer of 2020.

L-R – Marie Curie Registered Nurse, Katie Northin and St Gemma’s Chief Nurse, Heather McClelland.

A first of its kind partnership in Yorkshire will see two hospice charities working together to support more people with life limiting illnesses across Leeds.

Marie Curie Bradford Hospice and St Gemma’s Hospice, Leeds, have announced a new partnership that will enable nine Marie Curie hospice staff to work at St Gemma’s on a short-term basis.

The secondment will provide St Gemma’s with the opportunity to care for more people around the clock on its in-patient unit in the coming weeks ahead.

St Gemma’s Chief Nurse, Heather McClelland, said “We are delighted to be working in a truly collaborative way with Marie Curie, the UK’s leading end of life charity. There are benefits for everyone involved – the Marie Curie hospice team can continue to do what they do best during their temporary pause in admissions, St Gemma’s Hospice will benefit from additional resource and skill, and we will potentially be able to admit more patients who need our care during this time, widening access to more of our community.

“It also gives us a real chance to share ideas, ways of working and ultimately improve the care we all provide to people with life limiting illnesses.

“We are grateful to Marie Curie for helping to make this happen.”

Sue Hogston, Marie Curie’s Head of Nursing & Quality in Yorkshire, said: “We are delighted to be able to support St Gemma’s, at a time when we have temporarily paused admissions to our own inpatient unit at the Marie Curie hospice in Bradford. While we recruit more staff and prepare to re-admit patients, this great collaboration gives us a fantastic opportunity to support another hospice, learn from the experience, and fundamentally make a difference to people locally in need of hospice care and support.

“I would also like to thank our six registered nurses and three healthcare assistants for taking up this amazing opportunity.”

Like many other health and care providers, both hospices are experiencing staffing shortage and need more staff to deliver high-quality care safely around the clock. To find out more about our vacancies visit https://recruitment.st-gemma.co.uk/home/registered-nurses/