MND patient hails Cambridge hospice at risk of funding cuts
Dr Rick Nelms has been looked after by the hospice since his diagnosis
A man living with a rare form of motor neurone disease (MND) fears how cuts at a Cambridge hospice could affect people like him.
Doctor Rick Nelms has been looked after by the Living Well service at the Arthur Rank Hospice since he was diagnosed with primary lateral sclerosis (PLE) in 2017.
In that time, he said he's been able to do things he may not have imagined doing otherwise.
"Just because you're dying doesn't mean your life comes to an end," Dr Nelms said.
"In my case, the process has been very slow, so they've enabled me to become an artist and to do a great deal of advocacy work."
The hospice could lose nine beds if it doesn't find more than £800,000.
Last week, Dr Nelms - who's also a biologist and an educator - handed in a petition to Downing Street alongside other campaigners and Cambridgeshire's Liberal Democrat MPs calling for planned funding cuts to be scrapped.
He's been living with PLE, which the Motor Neurone Disease Association said represents three in 100 cases of MND.
"If you're on a busy hospital site, people are rushing about and it's not a serene place, whereas the Arthur Rank Hospice is serene," Dr Nelms said.
"It's a great place to go to die because you can be surrounded by your family in peace."
The petition taken to Number 10 has been signed more than 15,500 times, according to the Liberal Democrats.
Pippa Heylings - Lib Dem MP for South Cambridgeshire - told us with the amount of support for the campaign so far, "I do think this will put all the negotiations on a different footing to find a solution together."
'We recognise there is more to do'
Figures from the party claim more than half of hospices ended the 2024–25 financial year in deficit, with two in five hospices planning cuts this year.
A spokesperson for the Department for Health and Social Care said the Government recognises the pressures hospices are facing.
“We have made the biggest investment in a generation - £100 million – to improve hospice facilities and have committed to £80 million for children’s and young people’s hospices over three years," the spokesperson said.
“We recognise there is more to do, and we are exploring how we can improve the access, quality and sustainability of all-age palliative care and end of life care in line with the 10-Year Health Plan.”
Most people will 'end up dying in hospital' if funding is cut
The Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said it has decided to pull the funding next year after undertaking an "affordability and value for money assessment."
However, the Trust said it wants to ensure appropriate end-of-life care is maintained locally, but Dr Nelms believes without the funding needed, many won't have a choice.
"Many hospices are unable to raise enough funds to do the work Arthur Rank does, and that means people are not supported through long disease processes like mine in the way that I have been supported," he added.
"I know 200 people next year will not have the choice to occupy those beds and those people will die elsewhere; some of them will die at home, but most of them will end up dying in hospital."