Romania

Beginning in 1992 with a small home-care team in the city of Brasov, our first Romanian charity partner, Hospice Casa Sperantei, has now become the leading palliative care and palliative care education provider in the region. The Princess Diana Centre for Palliative Medicine (a residential training centre) was then opened in 1997 in Brasov, followed in 2002 by the first in-patient unit and associated day-care and out-patient facilities. In 2011, we pioneered two mobile teams in Brasov County (Fagaras and Zarnesti) which serve poor rural populations.

To date, over 45,000 patients have received care and support from Hospice Casa Sperantei, as well as more than 100,000 family members.

In 2014, a further in-patient unit was opened in Bucharest, plus day care facilities. In 2018, work was completed on a Centre for children and families affected by life-limiting conditions, in Adunatii Copaceni, near Bucharest, which started operating in 2019 and became fully functional in 2021. The organisation is now working hard to expand the services at Copaceni from 2023 onwards, supported by Hospices of Hope.

Emanuel Hospice is the only provider of palliative home-care services in the North West of Romania. Without Emanuel Hospice, patients who need specialist palliative care would not be able to access it from home, and would need to travel long-distance to receive treatment.

Since 1996, when Emmanuel Hospice became the 2nd palliative care provider in Romania, over 3,171 adults and 288 children living with life-limiting illnesses have benefitted from their services.

Members of the hospice team also offer teaching programmes and vocational training – over 250 doctors and nurses have been trained in palliative care through introductory and advanced courses.

In 2022, at the Romanian Healthcare Awards (the largest competition with an international jury dedicated to doctors, medical teams and hospitals from Romania) Emanuel Hospice clinical team received the Diploma of excellence for “TEAM OF THE YEAR 2022″ for their outstanding provision of palliative care services palliative at home.