Children’s hospice: different children, common problems

Palliative care is medical care or treatment undertaken to improve the quality of life for terminally ill patients and their families. The main goal of the seminar was to facilitate the exchange of experiences between Latvian and Belarusian colleagues. Among the international experts were Mr. Aiva Sauka (psychotherapist) and Ms. Aina Briede (chaplain of the Riga-based NGO: “Society of Palliative Assistance for Children”). From the Belarusian side there were representatives of the civil charity organization “Belarusian Children’s Hospice”, Mr. Andrey Bogdanovich (intensive care pediatrician), Ms. Alena Kizino (psychologist), Ms. Irina Baidakova (a leading expert from The Department of Social Welfare), and medical nurses.

Chaplain services is an example for Belarus

Alena Kizino says: “I was impressed by the presentation of Ms. Aina Briede concerning the role of the chaplain in palliative care. A Chaplain is both, a spiritual worker and a psychologist, working in closed institutions – hospitals, hospices, in the army. His or her task is to assist a person in finding 'internal balance' and to assist in answering the most complicated existential questions. Ms. Aina works with children of different faiths. Unfortunately, here we still have a different mentality and attitude on the part of the Orthodox and Catholics towards other confessions”.

Ms Alena Svirkina, Assistant to the Regional Project Manager of the EU Project “Improving Belarus and Latvian Cooperation on Palliative Care for Children” explains that Belarusian Children’s Hospice found the following practices the most valuable:  “The experiences of our Latvian colleagues were extremely useful for us, in particular, concerning the so-called ‘sand therapy’ (there is a special psychologist with proper experience in the Latvian hospice). It is a very simple therapy: you take a wooden box, fill it with sand and then let a child place figures there. Then the psychologist deduces  the state of mind of the little patient, depending on what he or she has created. It has been noted that the closer a child is to death the more trees appear in the sand and the fewer humans…”

Working with siblings and with cases of depression was also discussed at the seminar.

Parents’ club is a good example for Lavtians

Latvian partners learned something too. They found the idea of Belarusian Parent’s club very useful. This brings together relatives and friends of ill children. Group therapy helps them to understand what would be the best way to resolve the day to day issues and problems that they face. It is helpful for them to realize that lots of people are in the same situation and that it is both possible and necessary to come to terms with it. Latvians do not yet have group therapy programmes and primarily concentrate on individual therapy.

One full day of the seminar was devoted to the exchange of experiences regarding tools and techniques for dealing with terminally ill children and their parents, as well as issues of psychological stability of the staff.

The seminar will be followed up on 9 March in Riga, when medical staff of the Belarusian hospice will have a chance to witness the work of Latvian colleagues dealing with palliative care. On 10 April, an international conference “Palliative Care” will take place in Riga within the framework of the EU project referenced above.

The Belarusian Children’s Hospice will be represented by its Director, Ms Anna Garchakova, the Coordinator of the project “Improving Belarus and Latvian Cooperation on Palliative Care for Children”, Mr. Andrey Bogdanovich, as well as representatives of the Ministry of Health of Belarus. Both Latvian and Belarusian hospices are professional organisations having over 10 years of experience in dealing with palliative issues . They have lots of valuable experiences to exchange and therefore will learn a lot from each other.

For reference

The Charity NGO “Belarusian Children’s Hospice” (BCH) was founded in 1994 by the Republican Oncology and Hematology Centre for Children in order to provide holistic assistance to terminally ill children who cannot be treated in hospitals and are sent home. The hospice cares for children between 0 to 24 years old, 67 per cent of them being oncology patients. The others have chronic or genetic terminal illnesses. BCH is a out patient hospice, meaning that the patients are being treated at home and those who are able attend the hospice on an appointment basis. A doctor and a nurse are assigned to each family and psychologists and volunteers work with the relatives and children.

By Natalia Sharai
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