19. Caroline Hamblett

Caroline Hamblett has been Chief Executive Officer at Weldmar Hospicecare since 2016. She joined the charity after having spent 23 years at Marie Curie taking on different roles before becoming Deputy Chief Executive there. Prior to working at Marie Curie, Caroline worked in the commercial sector, but became quite disengaged with the profit side.

Caroline says “The thing that I love most about Weldmar is that you can see that you’re making a difference. I think often in organisations, it’s quite hard to see the impact that you’re having. Every day you’re going to be helping a family who has probably not been through this before and you can make it as good as you can. So that’s what’s special about Weldmar.”

Caroline remembers a patient that she spoke with, not long after she started at Weldmar who made a huge impression. He had wanted to stay at home with his dog but was unable to, so went into the Inpatient Unit along with his beloved pet. She says “One of the things that impacted on me was that he was by himself and he didn’t know who to phone at two o’clock in the morning. So that meant when he did phone and then the ambulance came, he had to go into hospital before he came to us.” This situation led to the 24/7 helpline being set up, “so that somebody had someone to call, so that they didn’t have to go into hospital. Maybe we could hold them, or they could come in into the Inpatient unit. That made a big impact for me, and he was happy here, alongside his dog.”

Caroline hopes that her legacy at Weldmar is that she brought financial security to the charity, and also that people reflect “that it was a nice place to work and hold on to the values.”