We’re thrilled to share that Willow Wood Hospice won the Retailer of the Year award and received a Special Commendation for Care in the Outstanding Contribution to Tameside category at the Tameside Business Awards.
The awards ceremony took place on Wednesday night at The Village Hotel in Ashton-under-Lyne.
We were represented by our CEO Tracy Minshull, Chairman Timothy Jackson, Clinical Director Nicola Cheetham, Director of Fundraising & Communications Sam Duncan, Head of Retail Pauline Lunt, and Partnership Development Lead Joanne Lees.
These honours are a testament to the dedication, compassion and relentless hard work of our incredible workforce – which is all of our staff and volunteers.
We have also been shortlisted in the Social Enterprise / CIC / Charity of the Year category at this year’s Pride of Tameside Business Awards.
We will find out if we have been successful on Friday 13th June at Dukinfield Town Hall – fingers crossed!
Pictured: CEO Tracy Minshull and Clinical Director Nicola Cheetham (left) with our Special Commendation for Care and Director of Fundraising and Communications Sam Duncan and Head of Retail Pauline Lunt with our Retailer of the Year award.
Willow Wood and GTD Healthcare have been working in partnership on an exciting 12-month pilot project, aimed at enhancing the delivery of palliative care at the Hospice.
The initiative, which began in February 2025, was developed from an idea of the Hospice’s Clinical Director Nicola Cheetham.
A passionate advocate for nursing, Nicola proposed trialling a new model of care that places a senior nurse with enhanced skills and non-medical prescribing (NMP) responsibilities alongside doctors on the Hospice’s Inpatient Unit.
Nicola said: “This collaboration builds on the success of our previous partnership in 2022, when GTD Healthcare supported our out-of-hours medical cover.
“We are excited to see how this new initiative enhances patient care and look forward to working closely with GTD Healthcare to develop further opportunities for partnership and service improvement.”
Recognising the value of this innovative idea and the challenges of implementing it, GTD Healthcare – a social enterprise that delivers GP practices, urgent care and community services across the North West – provided one of its experienced clinicians to support the pilot.
Claire Wilson, a Senior Clinical Practitioner and Specialist Palliative Care Nurse, has had a positive impact since February when she started working two days a week alongside the Hospice’s medical and nursing teams, delivering specialist palliative care within the Inpatient Unit.
Claire Wilson has been working on the Inpatient Unit at the Hospice since February
Claire said: “This is such an exciting opportunity for me — it’s the first time I’ve worked in Tameside, but having worked in a hospice before, I know just how special and impactful they are.
“The team here have made me feel incredibly welcome. I see this as not just a learning opportunity for the whole team, but for me too. Ultimately, everything we do is about enhancing patient care, and I’m really proud to be part of this pilot.”
In addition, Margaret Hayes, Palliative Care Lead at GTD Healthcare, is also overseeing clinical supervision to the Hospice’s Inpatient Unit team on a monthly basis.
A full evaluation of the pilot will take place after six months but the early feedback has been overwhelmingly positive.
Margaret commented: “This is a great opportunity for GTD Healthcare to work with our wider partners and show the wide range of knowledge and expertise that the organisation has. We are really looking forward to our ongoing work with Willow Wood and to see how the project progresses.”
Danny Goodwin was a loving husband, father and family man, and a lifelong Manchester United fan and an avid concert-goer.
“He was quite an active person and we used to go dancing together,” his wife Vera said. “He liked to go out and keep busy – he used to like going for a pint and he was in a quiz team.”
Born in Hattersley and one of eight children, Danny was brought up in the countryside and loved walking.
“We used to go on hikes with dad’s (large!) extended family when we were kids which has left us with such happy memories,” his daughter Jane told us.
“He was always good at art and took some lessons later in life – we have some of his paintings hanging in our homes.”
Danny harnessed his interest in art to become a painter and decorator, and his love of the outdoors led to him volunteering in the Willow Wood Hospice gardens for 15 years.
He was inspired to give back after one of his sisters, Janet, received end-of-life care at the Hospice.
“Dad loved helping out in the gardens and he would even bring our beloved dog Cassie with him. I came with him one day just to help too,” said Jane, who lives nearby in Ashton-under-Lyne.
“He also helped out at some fundraising events – he would get involved in the duck race and took part in the Firewalk one year too.”
Danny at the duck race
‘Fantastic care – not just for my dad, for us too’
Danny was therefore familiar with the Hospice’s surroundings when he became ill.
“He said he really wanted to go to Willow Wood Hospice,” Vera explained. “It was always where he wanted to be. He was very happy in here although he was really poorly.
“You weren’t worried about leaving him at Willow Wood because you know he’d be really well looked after.”
Danny came to the Hospice’s Inpatient Unit in June 2015 and spent eight days in our care before he died from lung cancer, aged 73. His family were very grateful for the care he received.
Danny’s daughter Louise said: “The staff were really good and attentive. I can’t praise them enough, honestly. Fantastic care – not just for my dad, for us too. We felt he was in such good hands and it took a lot of the stress off us, particularly my mum. Nothing was too much trouble. You don’t feel rushed to leave and we could bring the dog to see him. It feels like you can come any time and it feels peaceful.
“Just to be able to come and spend time in such a beautiful environment was so lovely. It was June so the weather was lovely and we used to wheel him outside so he wasn’t indoors all the time – the rooms are attached to the gardens which is great.”
How Danny’s family still support the Hospice
Jane (left), Vera (centre) and Louise in the Hospice gardens
Louise said realising the Hospice was largely funded by donations from the community was the driver to support it more.
Jane added: “I just feel like that’s what he’d want us to do. He would be proud.”
Since Danny’s death, the family have supported the Hospice in a number of ways.
Vera, Jane and Louise all play our weekly Lottery and have attended fundraising events over the years, while Vera also donates clothes to our charity shops.
“We go every year to the Flower Festival, the Last Night of the Proms and the Garden of Lights, which are all lovely events,” said Louise.
Jane added: “We always donate for Light up a Life. Louise and I also did the Midnight Wander before dad died. The year after, I did the abseil from Ikea and managed to raise £1,000. I just felt that I needed to give something back and I loved it.
“My dad also decided that he wanted donations at his funeral to go to Willow Wood.”
Jane (left) and Vera at the IKEA abseil
They also attend the Butterfly Memory Release every summer in the Hospice gardens that Danny helped to maintain.
“It’s just beautiful and particularly because it’s in the gardens where dad volunteered,” said Jane.
“It’s amazing how many people come to it. It’s just a very nice, calming atmosphere. It’s peaceful and you can just reflect.”
‘People should not be fearful of a hospice’
Living locally, Danny’s family were aware of Willow Wood but didn’t know much about it until Danny’s sister Janet was cared for.
They think more people are becoming aware of what hospices do and that they are not places to be feared.
“I think people are more aware of it these days, definitely. I think people should not be fearful of a hospice at all,” Louise said.
“I have said to people that I know that the Hospice is a beautiful place. It’s uplifting in a way. The fact we can still come in years later is of great comfort to us.”
They want others to support Willow Wood so our specialist teams can continue to support more families like theirs.
“It’s worth supporting the Hospice because people need it,” said Jane. “It’s an important part of the community as well. When we come to the Coffee Mornings here, or the other events, we’re here for a sad reason in our lives, but it’s still a lovely community feeling.”
If you would like to find out more about the services Willow Wood Hospice provides, you can visit www.willowwood.org.uk or call 0161 330 1100.
At Willow Wood Hospice, collaboration isn’t just a word – it’s the foundation for how we work.
Our mission is to lead and deliver high-quality, specialist palliative and end-of-life care, support and education to those in our local community living with a life-limiting illness.
We achieve this through close-knit teamwork that puts our patients and those closest to them at the centre of everything we do.
For years, our dedicated staff have worked closely with the Community Specialist Palliative Care (CSPC) team. This collaboration is more than a partnership – it’s an integrated approach to care.
Every day, nurses, who are part of the CSPC team, from Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust join our daily triage meetings and engage with all of our clinical teams – from Wellbeing Support to Therapy Support.
They provide specialist support in a patient’s home environment, as well as education and support to staff within the local community – such as GPs and district nurses.
The Specialist Palliative Care team based at Willow Wood Hospice
Since 2019, the community palliative care and respite teams have made the Hospice their home, while the hospital palliative care team joins us weekly, representing the multidisciplinary team.
This regular interaction enables us to provide holistic care to patients and those closest to them from across our community, ensuring they receive the services and support they need when they need it most.
Zoe Price, on behalf of the Community Specialist Palliative Care team, said: “We carry out joint visits if required and are always liaising with all teams, ensuring a patient receives the right service at the right time.
“We have a close working relationship with the Hospice teams. Daily conversations and communication help make our patients’ experience the most positive it can be during a difficult time.
“We are continually sharing information, sometimes on an ad-hoc basis, which we may not have the opportunity to if we were not in the same environment.”
Rebecca Stimson, Community Services Therapy Lead at the Hospice, commented: “Working collaboratively with the Specialist Palliative Care nurses ensures that the needs of all patients and those closest to them are assessed holistically.
“We work closely with the Specialist Palliative Care nurses and patients are supported by this, as they know their needs are being addressed.”
Our Medical Director, Dr Mary Ann Mahadevan, recently travelled to Sri Lanka where she learned more about the work of Jaffna Hospice.
Accompanied by her husband Dush, who is also a doctor and whose family hail from the south-east Indian Ocean island, Mary Ann delivered an insightful and engaging presentation to share knowledge with their staff and student nurses.
“I talked about how palliative care services are generally structured in the UK, as well as some common challenges,” she explained.
“I then talked more specifically about the services that we deliver in Tameside and Glossop and at Willow Wood. I enjoyed telling them all about our hospice and showing them pictures of our facilities and staff.”
Upon visiting the 22-bed inpatient hospice, which first opened in January 2006, she discovered how they administer palliative care with finite resources.
“It is a beautiful and well-cared-for place with lovely gardens just like Willow Wood,” Mary Ann noted. “The thing that struck me the most was the dedication of the staff to deliver the best care they could with the limited resources they had available.
“There were lots of differences between the organisations and the care that is delivered but the thing that we definitely had in common was the passion of the staff.
“Hospices in the UK are really struggling right now, but it really pales in comparison to what they are working with over there.”
Mary Ann reflected on the visit as being “really interesting, inspiring and thought provoking” from which she learned a lot.
“I think the importance of sharing knowledge and experience with others is really valuable as we can all learn from each other,” she stated.
“I learned about how palliative care is delivered in a completely different healthcare system, as well as the value of community in caring for people as they approach the end of life.”
Mary Ann hopes the experience can mark the beginning of a lasting relationship between the hospices.
“I would be really keen to support them with their education and training needs, and I hope that our experiences can help them to develop as a service. They were really keen to forge an ongoing relationship with Willow Wood and I would be very happy with that.”
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