At St Luke’s Hospice, the Coordination Hub delivers urgent end-of-life care across Devon. The Hub provides immediate clinical assessment and intervention, rapidly responds to patients in crisis, supports families to keep loved ones at home and enables timely, patient-centred care. Patients approaching the end of life frequently experience rapid deterioration, often resulting in distressing and avoidable hospital admissions due to delays in community response. Between April and October 2025, the Coordination Hub managed 2,127 calls, initiated 595 urgent home visits, supported 187 patients to remain at home, and prevented 37 ambulance conveyances.

Funds supported St Luke’s to pay for a specialist Paramedic for three years within its Rapid Response Service, part of the Coordination Hub. The Paramedic role is central to this model, providing advanced clinical assessment, symptom management, and coordination with ambulance, primary care and community services. It is also central to maintaining safe, responsive and high quality end-of-life care in the community, at a time of extreme pressure on the wider healthcare system.

The Rapid Response Service enables St Luke’s to sustain a proven, high-impact service that improves patient experience and enables more people to see out the time they have left with their loved ones in their preferred place of care.  The Paramedic role directly protects the welfare and dignity of patients at the end of life.