Author: chris

At that most difficult of times in a family’s life, our community is fortunate to benefit from the experience and guidance of HI Friends’ End-of-Life Support Worker, Jo Franklin. Eddy Moore met with Histon resident Jo to find out more about this crucial and sensitive role.

Jo Franklin is a trained and experienced palliative care and end-of-life nurse who advocates for, and offers support to, those who wish to die in their own home. She is able to help people prepare by starting conversations around their wishes, identifying the types of support available and liaising with GPs, district nurses and other professionals.

This part-time role is funded by local wellbeing charity HI Friends which has diversified over the years from a sports and leisure focus into a charity concerned with all areas of health and wellbeing. Originally working as a volunteer, Jo saw a way her expertise could contribute to the local community having supported a neighbour, bed-bound for eight months during COVID, to die at home avoiding a distressing hospital admission.

Dignity in death

In previous generations, a death was an event which occurred in the community and more people died at home than in hospital. Afterwards, the body would be laid out and family and friends would visit before the funeral service. With advances in treatment, death has become more medicalised as people are living for longer often with a number of illnesses. Hospices can provide excellent care but only about 5% of deaths occur there. Care homes are also well set up for end-of-life care and provide a setting where a team of carers and nurses can support people at the end of their lives.

However, having witnessed traumatic deaths in hospital settings, Jo is keen that, as far as possible, death should be a peaceful rite of passage in a more humane setting. Approaches to her come from families and carers needing advice, friends in the community, referrals from local churches or from HI Friends itself.

Jo describes her role as, “like a Doula for death” – a Doula is a non-medical professional who provides guidance and support before, during and for a short period after the birth of a baby.

Very often someone with a terminal diagnosis coming home from hospital will have family and carers who provide intimate care, visits from District Nurses, GPs and a host of people on the periphery who support in practical ways such as collecting prescriptions, doing shopping and cooking meals. Jo is able to coordinate support such as provision of a hospital bed when a bed in a different room is required, helping families and carers with the package of care, and sign-posting questions to ask the health professionals.

Jo explains that fundamental care across all areas is essential. She describes palliative care as “the icing on the cake – and icing can’t go on an unbaked cake”.

Stressing that end of life is unpredictable by its nature, lasting a year, months, weeks or days, Jo is keen for people to realise that, once a doctor has assessed someone as having reached that point, funding is available for continued healthcare.

A privileged position

For a community to have access to someone with Jo’s experience and skills is very unusual. She is incredibly knowledgeable and is able to help in many practical ways as well as providing calm, caring, emotional support helping families and carers to recognise the stages that mark the end of someone’s life. She says it has been a privilege to be present with some families and speaks very movingly of how the end of someone’s life can occur peacefully in their home environment. She likens the natural process of dying to that of giving birth.

Jo has another part-time job working for the NHS 111 service. In Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, anyone phoning 111 can choose Option 4, which will put you through to a 24hr-service with the Palliative Care Hub. Jo says she finds this role less rewarding as there isn’t an opportunity to build up a relationship with callers in the way she can within the Histon and Impington community, but she deeply values being part of that very supportive team.

Patience and understanding

After a death, Jo is not in a position to offer ongoing support but can signpost a range of services which can help those who have been bereaved. “Don’t be afraid to talk about death”, she says. “It is still a massive taboo which we need to break down and, even if you don’t know what to say, just being with someone and listening is so important.”

For those dealing with the impending death of someone close, Jo recommends reading ‘With the End in Mind’ by Dr Kathryn Mannix. “Everyone should read this book”, she implores “and her videos on YouTube are also incredibly helpful”, says Jo.

And, as Jo explains, “helping people and their families approach the end of life with the correct care package in place, a deeper understanding of the stages they will go through, and in a place they wish to be, can be a natural, spiritual and elemental experience”.

Jo Franklin can be contacted at HI Friends here. Email jo@hifriends.org.uk or phone her on 07752 016164.

The following organisations can also offer palliative and bereavement support:  

• Hope Again – visit here
• Cruse Bereavement Care – visit here or call 01223 633536
• Olive Tree Bereavement Support at Bar Hill Church visit here
• Sue Ryder support – visit here 
• Arthur Rank Hospices – visit here.