St Clare's Hospice plans: Children's hospice care not being considered under proposals

Care bosses are to unveil plans for the future of palliative care after St Clare’s Hospice went into insolvency.

The specialist nature of children’s care – which at present is provided in Newcastle – means they don’t think the current process could ‘change it in a way that is positive’.

“Children’s palliative care is a really specialist service,” Matt Brown, director of operations at South Tyneside Clinical Commissioning Group told a meeting of South Tyneside Council’s Hebburn Community Area Forum.

“We haven’t been looking at changing the model for children’s specialist care and I don’t want to create an unrealistic expectation we’re going to do that next.

“I don’t think we can realistically change the model for children’s palliative care through this exercise, but we will go back and think about it.”