Winter Wellbeing in the Bag!
Thanks to funding from the Ladywood and Northfield Neighbourhood Network Schemes (NNS) and the Sutton Coldfield Charitable Trust, BCHC Charity were able to continue to provide winter wellbeing bags to patients and service users in need this past winter.
Former Chief of Nursing and Therapies, Marcia Perry, came up with the idea to deliver a winter support bag scheme to provide people in Birmingham with items to help keep them warm during wintertime. Since the project launched in winter 2022-23, BCHC Charity has delivered over 2,000 bags across the city!
The cost-of-living crisis declared in 2022 has meant that there has been a significant rise in food and energy prices which has outpaced the rise in incomes, with many patients reporting that they were having to make difficult decisions between heating and eating during colder months. Feedback from our clinical colleagues and contacts in the community say that sadly this is still the case, as people continue to struggle with food and fuel costs.
The bags each contain a hot water bottle, vacuum flask with soup and hot chocolate sachets, fleecy blanket, a hat and scarf set, and mindful colouring supplies. Peter Millington from Age Concern Birmingham shared a story about 'Mrs A' who received one of the bags; “Mrs A is a widow, aged 87, who lives alone. She feels isolated and benefits from our home visiting service. She struggles meeting energy costs, and has really enjoyed the warm blanket, hat, and colouring book.” Peter also told us that they were “impressed by the high quality of the products in the bags. They were a lovely thing to give out during the cold.”
Adam Sookia, Service Clinical Manager for BCHC's Cardiac and Respiratory Services, said, “The winter bags have been a really helpful, well received, and appreciated resource provision to some of our frail and elderly patients within the heart failure service, as always… One of our female elderly patients thoroughly appreciated the blanket, hot water bottle, and thermos during the extreme cold snap weeks in January. This provision proves invaluable to some of our elderly patients that sometimes have very little social contact other than health care professionals.”
The charity included feedback cards in each bag, which were free for people to post back to us with their thoughts, and we received some lovely comments from recipients, such as, “It really made my day, I am really happy! Thank you so much”, “I was surprised and pleased with the donations received. They were a welcome gift. Thank you all”, and “I am pleased to receive such useful gifts.”
BCHC Charity would like to offer our sincere thanks to the NNS's and charitable trust for funding this years' round of wellbeing bags, as well as all the volunteers who have given their time to pack the bags to allow us to make a huge difference to patients across the city.