Fundraising for the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) at Southampton General Hospital began in August 2004. It was predominantly controlled by the Hospital’s Charities Team; however a year later those involved felt that a charity, independent of the Hospital, would improve the ability to control what the money was spent on and would also allow the charity to focus on fundraising for PICU, with the aim of increasing the donations received.
Friends of PICU was established in August 2005 by a nurse (
Rosie Mitchell) and family and friends of children who had been admitted to the unit. Meetings were held in the living room of one of their houses. The charity was initially represented by Jess Hutchinson (Chairman), Rosie Mitchell (Treasurer), Nigel Rennie (Secretary) & Tina Dine (Corporate Sponsorship Officer). Phillipa and Tony Mitchell, Matt and Pippa Hutchinson and Jennifer Jones formed the rest of the committee members.
Our elephant and child logo was designed by a parent of one of the children who had been on the unit – Russell West.
The charity grew and in November 2006 we became a registered charity. With lots of support from parents and friends our fundraising totals started to jump up:
Since the initial meetings back in 2004, we have raised nearly £500,000 pounds. We are very proud of this achievement and thank everybody who has made this possible.
All of the money goes towards PICU and enables us to purchase large pieces of life-saving equipment, create comfortable living and relaxing areas for parents, and more simple but important items like socks, mittens, and DVDs for the children.
The charity is run by parents, nurses, relatives and friends of children who have been on the Unit and have real experience of what is needed and wanted to make the stay on PICU as welcoming and comforting as possible. See some of their stories
here.
On 20th November 2011 Friends of PICU will be celebrating 5 years as a registered charity.
