Hospice says bereavement care is "inadequate"
Shooting Star Children's Hospice operates a hospice in Essex
Last updated 2nd Oct 2025
The hospice that runs Havens House says that bereavement care for parents is "inadequate."
Shooting Star Children's Hospices says that families accessing their specialist bereavement support has increased 74%.
They are calling on the government to get involved with bereavement care, and embed the support in national policy.
Paul Farthing, Chief Executive of the hospice, in interview with Greatest Hits Radio Essex News said:
"We are now helping four out of five families in our area, and all that is funded by generous donations.
"It is a really comprehensive package of professional counselling and therapy.
"Bereavement is a mental health issue, it can have long term impacts.
"Nine in ten parents will be subject to some form of post traumatic stress.
"We want the government to recognise bereavement and grief as a mental health issue."
He also said that families may take their services at different points after a death:
"Sometimes families aren't ready to get support in the first weeks, days, months.
"But there are also situations where we have gone to A&E departments and taken a family home after the death of their child."
Paul also commented on the different nature of grief when it comes to the death of a child:
"Historically, we tend to think of grief, particularly when we think about older people dying, as part of the natural course of life. That's understandable.
"But losing a child is not a normal event.
"It is incredibly traumatic, it needs specialist bereavement support, and extended support over time to help the family cope with the original trauma and then to move on and rebuild their lives."
"The service set itself the ambition to be there for every family that loses a child.
"Our next goal is to share that experience, with other organisations so they can build up their services.
"We want to encourage the government to come alongside, and work with us in partnership to co-fund these services and make them sustainable in the long-term.
"We should not be relying on charity donations long-term to be tackling specific issues around specialist bereavement support and the mental health issues that come from the death of a child in a family."