Volunteers to do health-related work in the community

The Malta Resource Centre will soon start recruiting volunteers to carry out health-related work in the community and at the new Mater Dei Hospital.

The MRC is in the process of finalising a partnership agreement with the Health Ministry to set up the Volserv project, which will offer structured voluntary services at the main hospital and within the community.

Project executive Nicola Critien explained that the volunteers - who will be offered training - will be able to help patients by seeing to their non-medical needs, like walking them to the chapel or visiting them when they return home.

As a first step, the project will focus on providing a service of guidance to patients and relatives and help them get to their destination once the new hospital opens.

Project assistant Nicolette Zammit Lupi, herself a volunteer, said the aim was to make people feel welcome, find their way around the new hospital and to extend sympathy.

Ms Critien said the project will start from the Outpatients Department. Eventually, the needs of each hospital ward will be analysed to see where the volunteers can best be made use of. Information-related services in the community will also be launched in the near future.

Ms Critien said the organisation aimed at forming partnerships with a number of voluntary organisations, though individual volunteers were welcome.

She said a number of groups have been contacted, though the recruitment campaign is not expected to start for some weeks. She stressed that the volunteers will in no way try to replace the staff, but instead work alongside. In the UK, volunteers dedicate about 20 million hours a year.

The Malta Resource Centre was set up in 2004 as an SOS Malta initiative with the aim of supporting and strengthening civil society.

It aims to help NGOs and other groups become more effective and efficient and to provide a stronger identity for the NGO sector.

The MRC, a non-profit and non-governmental organisation, provides a number of services to NGOs. It organises training programmes, courses, seminars and workshops focusing mainly on EU funding and capacity building.

Last month the MRC set up a network of NGOs working in the health sector, with the main objective being the enhancement of civil society contributions to the development of national health plans and policies according to EU directives.

Further information on the project can be obtained by phoning 2124 4123 or sending an e-mail on volservnet@mrc.org.mt.