Greenwich & Bexley Community Hospice

It was founded by the community, for the community. In 1985 two friends living with cancer, Pat Jeavons and Don Sturrock, saw the need for a local hospice and launched a fundraising campaign called "Give us a Quid". The Co-op offered the site of the old Shornells building on Bostall Hill in Abbey Wood for just £1, building work began in October 1992, and the hospice opened its doors in February 1994. More than 30 years on, Pat and Don's vision of local expert care at the end of life still guides everything it does.

The team supports people with pain and symptom management, rehabilitation, emotional and spiritual care, planning for the future, family support and bereavement, alongside a Wellbeing Hub for patients and the people who care for them. It costs around £12 million a year to provide this care, much of it raised locally through events, donations, gifts in wills and the hospice's charity shops, with the help of more than 350 volunteers. The hospice's purpose-built ground-floor rooms, with views over its gardens and Bostall Woods, can also be hired for meetings and events of up to 100 people.