Dad’s dream of helping dying kids close to reality

A GRIEVING family’s vision for a children’s Hospice and Palliative Care Centre for Cape Town may soon become a reality.

Transfer for a house, situated about a kilometre from the Red Cross Children’s War Memorial Hospital in Rondebosch, should go through by next week – according to businessman Rod Bloom, founder of the Rohan Bloom Foundation in honour of his son Rohan, who died in April 2016 after a long battle with cancer.

But a few months of consultation with neighbours and getting permits passed by the authorities lie ahead for the foundation and its partner Paedspal, a not-for-profit outpatient paediatric palliative care programme run by Dr Michelle Meiring.

Paedspal, based across the road from Red Cross in the Rondebosch Medical Centre, consists of a multidisciplinary team of doctors, counsellors, social workers and therapists who assist families with children who are living with chronic illnesses to which some will succumb.

The children’s last days are made comfortable with palliative care, which includes aromatherapy, art and music therapy. Paedspal also assists families through the bereavement.

Bloom said the hospice, which will be run by Dr Meiring and her team and is likely to be opened early next year, should be able to accommodate eight children at a time and have place for their parents to stay.

“When a child is terminal, there is nowhere comfortable for them to pass away. This is such a great need, returning the dignity to the children. Some of the children are dying in backyard Wendy Houses.

“In mostly disadvantaged areas, the families don’t have the skill, resources and in most cases, a comfortable environment for their child to live out their final days. The families are also under pressure financially.

“In the oncology ward at Red Cross, the doctors and nurses are spending all their time and energy trying to save children’s lives. In one room, you will have a child receiving treatment and in the next door room, a child will be dying. The rooms aren’t sound proofed. Need I say more?

“This hospice will provide relief for families whether in the form of respite care, pain and symptom control or terminal care,” said Bloom, who is continually engaged in raising awareness for the hospice.

The foundation’s latest campaign involves a 12-member cycling team who will participate in the Coronation Double Century cycle race, which takes place in Swellendam next Saturday, November 25.

‘There is nowhere