About Demelza, Hospice Care for Children
Demelza is an organisation providing hospice care for over 400 children with life-limiting illnesses and their families across Kent, East Sussex and South London through:
Residential Hospice Care
Demelza House is an eight bedded hospice in Sittingbourne Kent, providing respite, symptom control, end-of-life care and bereavement support. Over 300 life-limited children and their families benefit from a wide range of facilities that include a multi-sensory room, Soft Play, Jacuzzi, and The Inclusion Zone for young adults. Available therapies include music, physiotherapy and aromatherapy. The Care Team, led by children’s specialist palliative care nurses, make the most of every moment that the child spends at Demelza House. Parents have described having the opportunity of an undisturbed night’s sleep as pure luxury. At the end of the child’s illness, we offer a comprehensive service of support using a bereavement suite - known as the Hop Garden – which enables a family to let go and say goodbye at their own pace. We share our expertise in childhood bereavement with organisations such as the Police and the bereavement charity, CRUSE.
Hospice at Home Care
Demelza-James provides a hospice at home service for over 100 children in East Sussex, South West Kent and South London with life-threatening and life-limiting illness and their families. The service complements the care offered at Demelza House with the Demelza-James specialist paediatric nurses going directly into the family home to provide care, crisis intervention, an on-call service and respite. The service helps enable the family to live life, as a family, in their own environment and combined with Demelza House offers flexibility in care provision. When a child reaches the end of its life Demelza-James can offer the choice of 24 hour end of life care at home. Demelza-James can provide medical help and expert advice in the home or can simply just allow Mum and Dad to be Mum and Dad again.
Our Child project in South London
This project plans to provide a 6 bedded new hospice. Helping newly identified children in the South London who have life-limiting conditions by providing residential respite, hospice-at-home care, end of life care and bereavement services for the immediate and wider family, as well as increasing the number of respite days available to existing Demelza children.
Our history
The hospice was conceived by Derek and Jennifer Phillips following the death of their daughter, Demelza, aged 24, who worked at a children’s hospice called Acorns in Birmingham.
The Fundraising Appeal started in September 1994, seeking to raise £3million to build, equip and maintain Demelza House.
Building began in April 1997 and completed a year later after £3million was raised from within the community through major gifts from individuals, companies, sponsored events and other activities, and legacies.
Countess Mountbatten opened the building officially in June 1998 and the first children arrived in September 1998.
The hospice is set in 6.5 acres and is built in the style of a Kentish oasthouse. Its unusual ‘extended’ layout reflects how a typical 1800’s farmhouse would have enlarged as the family grew in size.