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Last week, just over 20 volunteers from both the Mt Druitt and Nepean Blue Mountains palliative care volunteer services underwent training in writing biography for people in palliative care.

Manager for the Nepean Blue Mountains Palliative Care Volunteer Service Carolyn Wilkinson says 12 of the trainees were from her service. Once trained, these volunteers will be a part of a pilot program for their biography service in the Nepean area.  If successful, she hopes it can be extended into the Blue Mountains.

Although they trained together, the volunteers from Mt Druitt Supportive and Palliative Care Services are not a part of this pilot project in the Nepean. Volunteer Manager Kylie Clark says she is focussing on growing her biography service to meet the needs of Western Sydney.

Kylie has been contacted by many people expressing an interest in training to become a palliative care biographer.

“There has been such big interest I already have people on a waitlist and am maybe looking to run another training session later in the year,” she said.

“Some of the trainee volunteers here today will just do biography and some will also receive the full palliative care volunteer training.”

If you are interested in volunteering as a biographer, or in palliative care, please use our service finder to locate a service near you. Those with a biography service will be tagged as such and you can get in touch with them using the contact details shown.

Photo: Volunteer Managers Kylie Clark (L) and Carolyn Wilkinson (R), with some of their new palliative care biography trainees.