I’m Ciara Barry and I’m a Senior Staff Nurse here at Northern Ireland Children’s Hospice. I’ve worked here since I qualified as a nurse back in 2012. Often, when I tell people I work at the Children’s Hospice, the (well-meaning) reaction I get is ‘Oh, that must be so awfully sad!’  

 In fact, it’s a wonderful, fulfilling and rewarding place to be a nurse. Because, when we care for a child, we enable such precious moments and truly unique experiences that simply can’t be offered anywhere else.   

Every child we care for has a life-threatening illness. So, our nursing is about keeping the child comfortable, taking care of the medical side of things and, ultimately, supporting the whole family – so the children can just be children; Mum and Dad can just be Mum and Dad.     

One such baby was little Jamie, who came to us last year. Jamie had Edward’s Syndrome, which is a chromosome defect that gave the little boy no hope of life beyond a few weeks. He was at the Hospice for five days and throughout his stay he had a dedicated nurse, just for him, looking after his needs all the time – I was privileged to be one of his nurses.   

Our hope and ambition, as with every baby, was to keep Jamie free from discomfort and pain, and allow him to be the baby within his family for whatever time he had.   

How you can help   

There are more and more babies like Jamie coming to us – and that’s why I’m writing to ask for your help today.  

- £30 can pay for one hour of nursing time in a family’s home

- £81, can pay for two whole hours’ complete care for a child at the Hospice

- £243 can pay for six hours’ complete care at Northern Ireland Children’s Hospice

That’s what it takes to give little ones like him the care they need – and the chance to create memories for a family that will last a lifetime.  

Have a lovely summer,

Ciara Barry

Senior Staff Nurse