The last three years acting as a trustee of this amazing organisation has been an honour and privilege for me during a time of development and change and I remain honored to continue in this role.

I started my very first role 20 years ago working as a social worker in a hospital, hospice and the community and ever since then I have been a passionate advocate for delivering truly integrated and holistic high quality care. I now have the privilege of leading an integrated health & care system as an Assistant Director of Adult Social Care in a neighbouring borough in Greater Manchester during what is a period of rapid change but also with many opportunities that health and care devolution presents.

Working in the Greater Manchester devolved health and care system I was disappointed to experience a complete lack of focus on end of life care but also as a trustee I wanted to make sure the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership was aware of the invaluable contribution that hospices make to our health and care system, not only in Bolton but across Greater Manchester. With encouragement and through the amazing work of our chief executive and unwavering support of our Board of Trustees Bolton Hospice stepped up to fill this void and led the formation of the Greater Manchester Hospice Networks. This in turn led to establishment of a Greater Manchester End of Life Improvement Programme and we now have Greater Manchester Commitments to Improving End of Life care.

During my time as a trustee I have also, with support of fellow trustees, championed making sure our organisation is a responsive to the needs of Bolton residents as it could be. Being aware that many people experience deterioration in their condition outside of normal hours it was important that we could respond outside those hours. Thanks to the great work of our Medical Director and support from our trustees I am pleased to say we are now able to admit patients to our wonderful inpatient unit over a greater number of hours than ever before and as a result even more people are benefiting from this great service.

I am also very proud of the role our hospice has performed in improving the end of life care provided to people living in care homes with the introduction of 2 dedicated nurses, as a result of this service there are 1580 Bolton residents living in care homes who now get better care than ever before.

What has been achieved so far is amazing and we can continue to work together to improve the care and support provided to all Bolton residents and improve and influence the delivery of high quality integrated end of life care for everyone in Greater Manchester.