Hospice Narratives Study

To complement the Hospice History Programme’s oral history interviews with professionals, this project recorded life stories with people with experience of life-threatening illness, both patients and relatives. The Hospice Narratives Study sheds light on patients’ perspectives of hospice care and explores how illness is understood in the context of life stories. The interviews have made possible a more insightful understanding of patient and family experience.

The project was carried out in two centres, at St Luke's Hospice, Sheffield, and St Benedict's Hospice, Sunderland. The study was conducted as a pilot project to gain experience of working in particularly sensitive and personal aspects of peoples’ lives. Material from this study is to be included in a new ‘Users Voices’ page on the Help the Hospices website.