Peterborough volunteers donate thousands of hours at hospitals

In total 567 volunteers work at Peterborough City, Hinchingbrooke and Stamford Hospitals but during the pandemic most of them are helping at home with only 22 remaining active on site.

During National Volunteers’ Week, 1 to 7 June 2020, we have been asking what they have been up to during these unprecedented times.

One of the services that has been launched in response to the pandemic is a new response volunteer service to help give support to areas that have found their workloads increase.

At Hinchingbrooke a few of the volunteers who are staying at home have set up a phone service where they call each of their colleagues to do a welfare check. This has been really well received with many stating they really look forward to receiving the call each week.

Carol North, Head of Volunteering, said: “It’s National Volunteers’ Week and we have been celebrating in a different way this year. Most of the volunteers are staying safe at home so we profiled some of them showing many of their stories on the hospital social media pages this week.

“I’m so proud of everything they do for us, the fact that they gave up 48,000 hours of their own time last year shows how selfless and committed they are. Thank you and we miss you team volunteers.”

Jo Travers, Volunteer Coordinator at Hinchingbrooke added: “It’s great that the volunteers offered to call the team at home – this means the volunteer family are still supported.

“I contact all of the volunteers daily by email by sending out our ‘Moments of Happiness’ presentation, which gives our volunteers the chance to share their updates with each other. This is really keeping their spirits up and helps to give a feeling of togetherness whilst we are apart.”