Children’s Hospice at Home

• Regular nurse visits at home: nursing care and emotional support for the child and family
• Symptom management: when the child is particularly unwell or their condition is changing  

• Advanced Care Planning: discussing and planning for the child’s future care needs
  
• Respite visits: giving parents the chance to rest, recharge, or spend quality time with other family members

• Play specialist sessions: run by our play specialists in the child’s own home or in our specially equipped play room at Grove House. These sessions enhance quality of life by providing a safe and supportive opportunity for play so the patient can simply be a child. 

• Coordination of care: our nurses can liaise with other healthcare professionals as needed 

• Access to other services: signposting and liaising with other services to facilitate access to equipment, services and support from other organisations  

• End-of-life care in the home: 24-hour, on-call support from our children’s nurses so the child and family can remain at home 

Core hours for scheduled or urgent visits are between 9am and 5pm. 

In addition, our on-call nurse is available for telephone support and advice from 8am to 8pm Monday-Friday, on weekends from 8am Saturday until 8am Monday, and on bank holidays 24 hours from 8am.  

For children approaching end of life, our nurses are available on-call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.   

Our Children’s Hospice at Home service is available across our catchment area of Herts and Bucks.  The boundaries broadly align with NHS clinical commissioning group boundaries, so we use a patient’s GP location rather than home address to determine whether a patient falls within our catchment area.  If you aren’t sure if you live in our catchment area get in touch.

Like all Rennie Grove Peace services, our Children’s Hospice at Home service is provided at no cost and is not means tested. We’re able to deliver this service through the combined support of NHS funding, grants from charitable trusts and foundations, and the generous support of the local community, particularly The Pepper Foundation, a local charity who have been fundraising exclusively for our children’s service for many years.   

If you’re a parent or carer of a child with a life-limiting illness, you can either:

• ask your GP to refer you to ‘Rennie Grove Peace Children’s Hospice at Home service’  (if you’re making the request by email you may wish to include this link for reference)

OR

• get in touch with us direct by phoning 01442 890222 or emailing help@renniegrove.org.  We can answer any questions you may have and help facilitate the process. 

If you’re a healthcare professional looking to refer, you can find referral criteria and instructions for this service here: