How can you help the Wide Horizon Hospice?
Gail Heasley, former CEO and manager of the Wide Horizon Hospice says people can help by donating funds.
“Even if it is just R20 or R30 or R50, every little bit helps. For us to remain operational we would require at least R50 000,” says Heasley.
Members of the public who can assist can pay money directly into the Wide Horizon Hospice’s account.
The Wide Horizon Hospice is registered as a Public Benefit Organisation in accordance with Section 18A of the Income Tax Act, which means that all donations made out to the organisation is fully deductible through your annual income tax
Banking details:
First National Bank
Three Rivers Branch (Branch Code: 251 337)
Account number: 5130 5869 261
About the Wide Horizon Hospice:
According Heasley, who joined the organisation in 2000 as a fundraiser, the Wide Horizon Hospice was originally started in 1985 by Edna Davis who was doing homebased care from the boot of her car.
A building was later donated where she started taking in terminally ill patients who could no longer cope on their own.
The unit, which was essentially an old house transformed into a palliative care unit, was designed to take only a few patients, but grew over the years.
According to Heasley the focus in the earlier years was on cancer patients and people with life limiting illnesses.
“At one stage we saw the influence of HIV in the community and opened a clinic that helped with those clients. The focus started to shift.
“The facility assisted patients to go for testing and then looked after those patients in the unit when they developed Aids and became too frail to work.
After ARV’s became widely available on the market there was an improvement in the lives of those suffering from HIV.
The Wide Horizon Hospice Outreach in later years turned their attention to mines where they would do outreaches.
The Wide Horizon Hospice still visits the Seriti Mine (New Vaal Colliery) regularly to do health screenings.
More than 14 years ago the Granny Program was born.
“Many of the patients who we cared for died and left their children behind. The children became reliant on their grandmothers, placing an additional burden on these elderly women who in most cases didn’t earn much and were reliant on a very small pension.”
“We managed to secure funding from Canada and were able to support 16 of our our grandmothers and about 20 children.
“Through the funding we were able to get brand new school uniforms for the children so that when, they went to school, they looked lovely and had all new clothes.
“This program is still operational, and we are very proud of that,” says Heasley.”
