I hope these first weeks of 2026 find you feeling refreshed and energized.
Reflecting on 2025, I can honestly say, “What a year it was!” in many wonderful ways. At the heart of it is the amazing team of staff and volunteers that make Victoria Hospice so special. Despite the challenges confronting the wider health system, our Inpatient Unit, Palliative Response Team and Community Support Centre (grief and bereavement) delivered essential end-of-life care and counselling with compassion and professionalism.
This is made possible by your incredible generosity and conscious choice to give to Victoria Hospice. From all of us, thank you. Your support means the world to us. In turn, we hope that you continue to be inspired and fulfilled knowing that your generosity positively impacts countless lives, for example:
A woman caring for her partner gets immediate help at home when a sudden pain crisis strikes in the middle of the night, avoiding a trip to the Emergency Department;
A child grieving a parent receives dedicated, age-appropriate counselling that helps them express their feelings in a calm, safe environment and begin the journey towards healing and emotional stability;
An individual’s last moments are spent held in comfort, surrounded by compassion; their life is celebrated, their death seen and honoured, their family supported.
Importantly, your support also enables vital work in education, training, and research, allowing us to offer essential courses and textbooks, develop evidence-based clinical practices, publish peer-reviewed research, and deliver training to our teams and care providers across the community. You may recall seeing our end of year campaign focused on child and youth grief and bereavement. That outreach prompted many of you to make a donation, so much appreciated, and it also prompted something I wasn’t expecting: a number of you got in touch to share personal stories of loss from your own childhood. Each person noted what a difference it would have made to have access to the kind of counseling that Victoria Hospice offers today.
This is the power of joining together.
It is the essential role you play in our compassionate circle of care, and it was illustrated perfectly when three individuals – each touched in different ways by Victoria Hospice care and support – offered to match all end-of-year donations to a total of $125,000. Among them was a gift in memory of Tim, read more here.
Every dollar of that heartfelt gift was matched, showing that expert, compassionate, patient-focused and family-focused care inspires giving, which enables us to continue providing this essential health care service in the beautiful community we all call home.
From our hearts to yours, thank you. I am looking forward to the year ahead, working together in service of our community to provide expert, compassionate end-of-life care for all. Sincerely,
Teri Henderson, RSW, MSW
CEO, Victoria Hospice
We’d love to hear from you. If you have questions about your impact or have a story or feedback to share, you’re always welcome to reach out by email or at 250-519-1744.