CEO Welcome

Established by the Religious Sisters of Charity in 1879, the Hospice in Harold’s Cross was opened in response to the healthcare needs of the community. Today, Our Lady’s Hospice & Care Services (OLH&CS) provides specialist care for a catchment of over a million people with a wide range of needs, from residential rehabilitation to end-of-life care, from our bases in Harold’s Cross, Blackrock (est. 2003) and Wicklow (est. 2020).

As the profile and needs of patients has changed over the years, the Hospice formed three core services, which are supported by education and research, as the bedrock of quality healthcare. Specialist palliative care is delivered in each of our three locations, making us the largest provider in Ireland. As well as in and out-patient services, we have community palliative care teams who manage patient interactions (including visits to patients’ homes and virtual meetings) across South Dublin and Wicklow.

Our main campus in Harold’s Cross houses the Rheumatic & Musculoskeletal Disease Unit, a unique service that enables those with a chronic condition to maintain or improve their quality of living.

Our Care of the Older Person service in Harold’s Cross comprises our Community Rehabilitation Unit (CRU) and a residential unit. CRU provides in-patient care for frail people aged 65 years and older who can benefit from a personalised rehabilitation programme.

The residential centre, Anna Gaynor House, is a safe comfortable home for older people with high dependencies. Over 660 medical and general staff and 400 incredible volunteers provide world class person-centred care to help patients and residents achieve their best quality of life and support their families.

Every day staff and volunteers uphold our core values of human dignity, compassion, justice, quality and advocacy.

We passionately believe that everyone living in our community should be able to access high quality person-centred care when they need it. We also believe that our services should be delivered in the most appropriate and effective way to meet the needs of patients and their families.

As we continue to grow, our services adapt to meet rising demand and the increasingly complex health and social care needs of our ageing population with more specialist facilities and services.

Our plans to enhance our care by building capacity, reconfiguring and integrating our services and workforce are based on best practice, evidence-based models of care and anticipated future needs.

OLH&CS is funded by the HSE to provide a defined level of service on its behalf and is a section 38 provider with a voluntary Board of Directors.

We rely on fundraising to enhance patient services and to continue developing our sites. We are lucky to be so wonderfully supported by the public and organisations through donations, fundraising events and bequests and for this we are truly grateful.

While we have achieved a lot together in recent times, we still need your assistance to help achieve our goals. There are many ways in which you can help us with our work. Thanks to the on-going support of our donors, volunteers and staff we will continue to play an important role in the lives of all our patients, residents and their families.

On behalf of our residents, patients, their families and our staff and volunteers, I would like to extend our most grateful thanks to all those who supported us.

Thank you.

Audrey Houlihan

CEO