Sister Frances Dominica Ritchie
Sister Frances has been providing palliative care for young people and supporting their families for nearly 30 years. She was awarded an RCN Fellowship in recognition of her pioneering work in the provision of care for gravely ill and dying children and their families.
She chose palliative care "because of an encounter with two-year-old Helen, who had surgery for a cerebral tumour and was cared for at home in a comatose state". Sister Frances took the little girl into her own home from time to time to give her parents a break from caring. From this she went on to found Helen House in Oxford, the world’s first hospice for children, where she is still a trustee.
She went on to found Douglas House, a "respice" for people between 16 and 40 with life-shortening conditions, which was opened by HM The Queen in 2004 and which is built in the same grounds as Helen House. Both houses offer respite care, accompanied by members of the family if they so choose, end-of-life care, and family support from the time of referral for as many years after the death of the young person as the family may wish.
Sister Frances has worked to improve "joined-up working" of all agencies involved in palliative care for people between the ages of birth and 40 who have life-shortening conditions.
Former Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children matron, Gwen Kirby, was a considerable influence in the direction that her career took.
Today Sister Frances takes great pleasure in watching the development of the children’s hospice movement in the UK and many other countries. She is also pleased to see the advent of the paediatric palliative care discipline, and hopes that that this will result in "an ever-spreading understanding of the needs of the families concerned", and people-centred nursing.