12. Caroline Sweetland

Caroline’s interest in palliative care started when she was a student nurse at St Thomas’s hospital in London. Following training her journey in palliative care saw her work at Trinity Hospice, St Bartholomew’s hospital, Macmillan, and St Margaret’s Hospice, before bringing her knowledge and expertise to Weldmar Hospicecare when she joined in the Education team. When changes were made to the organisation structure Caroline took the opportunity to apply for the Head of Nursing Role, before progressing to her current role of Director of Clinical Services.

Caroline feels very strongly that palliative care is very much about holistic care and the multi-disciplinary team approach. The team photo of the dragon boat racing event that Weldmar takes part in every year is a standout moment for Caroline and reflects what Weldmar is about. “It’s about people coming together working together and getting that boat going down the lake successfully without anybody falling in the water or the boat capsizing. And it takes everybody’s effort, everybody working together.”

Caroline loves working for a charity. “When you’re working for a charity, there’s that connection between the people that you’re serving. It’s an incredible thing that the people of Dorset are the ones who keep funding and enabling us to deliver these services.”

“I’m always mindful when we are making decisions about how to spend the money that somebody has organised a coffee morning and got their neighbours to make cakes and got somebody else to donate a raffle prize, and hoped the weather was good and all the effort that individuals have put in. Somebody else’s plucked up the courage to jump out of a plane with a parachute. It’s really making sure that we spend that money wisely.”