COULD you help enhance the lives of terminally-ill people in West Fife?

The Queen Margaret Hospice Garden Group have a dream to provide an accessible garden to help brighten the final days of West Fifers nearing the end of their lives.

They need £50,000 to provide it and have already raised £32,500 but need YOUR help to push them over their target.

The design brief for the garden at Queen Margaret Hospital allows patients to enjoy the space in beds or wheelchairs.

Dalgety Bay’s Anne Morton dreamed up the idea when visiting a friend and relative last year who lost their battles with cancer.

She told the Press: “This initiative is about life, not death.

“Patients should be able to experience what is going on around them with their loved ones in that last drop of life.

“My father stayed in a hospice and I always remember him saying it’s a joy to hear children playing.

“The garden will enhance life in its final moments.”

Raising £44,000 would just about create the garden the group has in mind but if the total goes beyond £50,000, it will enable more mature planting to be bought – bringing the space to life much more quickly.

Inspired by the anchor at St David’s Harbour at Dalgety Bay, they also hope to install a striking sculpture which would also provide some entertainment for children who visit the ward.

And it doesn’t stop there – the project will need volunteers, members and donators to help keep it going into the future.

NHS provision for outside spaces is something seen as something over and beyond normal delivery care but both Anne and Neale (pictured) praised the staff at NHS Fife for their willingness to help and assist the project.

When Anne was “haunted” by the memory of seeing a grandad trying to occupy young children while their mum died, she asked nursing staff if there were any outside spaces.

Seeing their distress in not being able to provide such a valuable place for patients and their relatives, she told them: “If you leave this with me, it will be done.”

Anne continued: “Well the nurses were beside themselves when I said that!

“But they could see someone was interested and I have to say the nursing staff completely fired my enthusiasm with their commitment to patients and families. From there, I got in touch with the managers in the NHS and we put a committee together.

“There has been no official call to the public yet and we’ve raised £32,500 through grants or word of mouth – I have to say it’s very exciting!”

The garden has received a significant boost from NHS Fife Endowment Funds.

Up to £25,000 of funds has been made available to the project – a collaboration between members of the public and representatives from health services.

Tricia Marwick, chair of NHS Fife, said: “We are delighted that up to £25,000 of NHS Fife Endowment Funds will support this very worthwhile project.

“We all know the tremendous difference the hospice makes to patients and their loved ones and a dedicated garden will further improve their experience.

“The enthusiasm of the Queen Margaret Hospice Garden Group is to be commended, and I look forward to seeing the transformation of this space into a fantastic garden that patients and their families can enjoy.”

Fiona Mackenzie, Fife Health and Social Care Partnership’s clinical service manager for the hospice, said: “This is a great opportunity to improve the environment and extend further care for patients and families. The team are heartened by the approach from the community and we are excited to see what we can achieve together.”

Anne signed up former Dunfermline councillor Neale Hanvey to the group when she met him at an unrelated event. He’s passionate about the initiative after his experience as a professional in the NHS. Anne said Neale’s “eyes lit up” when he heard her plans.

Neale trained as a psychiatric nurse in Fife and general nurse in Edinburgh before he went down to London to work for top health care providers such as University College Hospital. He primarily worked in cancer units and knows first-hand the experience of isolation felt by people who are extremely ill.

He explained: “Just that sense of being connected with the world and outside space was a real place of solace and comfort to patients.

“For young people and anybody stuck in a room, their ability to do anything is often restricted by their conditions. They’re in isolation for long, long periods of time so that loss of connection with outside space becomes really profound.

“They feel dislocated from the world and often one of the most common requests is, can I just get outside?”

He continued: “Just having a chance to go outside was enough, the sensation of feeling the sun on your face, the wind in your hair and the smell of rain was often what the people spoke of.

“There’s a lot of research about the value of the outside space in end-of-life care.

“Comparisons are often drawn between prisoners who have the right to have at least one hour a day outside.

“However, people who are hospitalised with profound conditions don’t have that right.

“When you think of the humanity of it, it’s tragic. That connection that we have with the outside is just taken for granted.”

Neale added: “You can tell how important this is to Anne and it’s just wonderful. I can get choked up about it when I hear her share the story.”

Visit www.gofundme.com/QMHGG to donate or to find out more about the group, email annemorton@btinter net.com