Suffolk Mental Health Trust send vital donations to help with their care and recovery

Hospitals, care homes, orphanages in Ukraine are benefiting from donations of furniture and equipment no longer used at Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Mental Health Trust (NSFT) and helping the trust save money on specialist disposal.

Two lorry loads of items were collected at the end of January, with another load due to be collected this month.

"It's the aspect of comfort and dignity for patients"

NSFT sustainability officer Gill Lee, who contacted Yorkshire Aid after hearing about them on an NHS forum, said:

“For the past 10 years NSFT has been working with many charities sending items that we can no longer use to hospitals abroad, including ones in Romania, Ukraine and Africa.

We asked Gill how she's able to see the impact these donations have on the communities.

She told us they recieve a lot of photos of the items being delivered and them being utilised in the hospitals.

"It's just the aspect of comfort and dignity for their patients, those patients have a much more comfortable stay in their hospitals than they would have done had we not donated this equipment...It feels lovely, especially when you get the photographs back.

""It's a basics of humanity"

She then explained that these donations, which would previously have been disposed of, are able to improve the care and the recovery of those who receive them and wants this to motivate other organisations to do the same.

"It's a basics of humanity, isn't it? Being able to have a comfortable lifestyle.

"Sleeping on the floor, not sleeping on a bed with no mattress on it. Not being able to keep your own belongings safe in a special area where you live.

"The orphanages don't have very much in Ukraine, so taking them, cooking equipment, mattresses, clothing, children's toys, bedside furniture for instance, they have nothing that they can put their own personal belongings in.

"So that makes for them to have a much more meaningful life experience in the establishments that they live in.

"And I think it's just giving those people that dignity that's so important for their well-being."

What is being donated?

Items shipped out over that time have included wheelchairs, mattresses, PPE, uniforms, pump-action beds, medicine trolleys, bathing chairs, children’s toys, chairs and tables and cardboard sick bowls/urine bottles.

Gill said, "Items condemned by infection control are sanded down, repainted, and used in care homes and orphanages. It’s heartening to see that items we discard will be sustainably reused and help make staff and patients in the homes have a better quality of life.”

She said electronic and biomedical engineering (EBME) equipment such as wheelchairs, walking aids, PMA equipment, meds trolleys, mattresses, beds, spare medical stocks such as PPE, vacutainers (but no medicines), curtains and non-washable chairs, some of which need specialist disposal.

“All of these would have been disposed of at a cost to NSFT, so this saves money and also has a positive effect on sustainability through reuse. We have saved about £3000 from these two lorry loads alone.”

A video has now been made by Yorkshire Aid to document the journey and what happens to the equipment when it arrives abroad. Silent Night: A Convoy to Ukraine was made by one of the Yorkshire Aid volunteers of a convoy into Kyiv.

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