Building support for Midlothian Community Hospital with staff room donation

This will be used to help revamp the staff wellbeing room and café, to encourage staff to take a break away from their wards during their shift.

Midlothian Community Hospital will now be able to purchase comfortable seating; including leather massage chairs, for their wellbeing room and café, making them welcoming spaces where staff are more likely to stay and take their well-earned breaks. Currently, staff often take breaks in small offices on their wards, meaning they are easily interrupted and often cut their breaks short.

Dandara, which is building a range of new homes locally, including at Eskbank Gardens in Dalkeith, Ashgrove in Straiton and in Shawfair, was pleased to make the donation to help support the wellbeing of the hardworking staff at the hospital, with something that will benefit them both now and in the future as they continue to deal with the lasting impact of Covid-19.

Linda Ferrier, service manager at Midlothian Community Hospital, said: “Our staff have been working incredibly hard during such challenging times, and we are trying to do all we can to support their physical and mental wellbeing.

"We are working with Edinburgh and Lothians Health Foundation to create a staff wellbeing area on site, and thanks to this generous donation from Dandara, we will be able to do even more with this space.

"Having new, comfortable seating in both the wellbeing room and the cafe will really make all the difference to our staff, giving them somewhere calm and welcoming to go to destress and just take some time out to clear their head before returning to the many pressures of the job.

"We are extremely grateful to Dandara for their generous donation.”

Lisa Archibald, head of sales at Dandara, added: “Like the NHS all over the country, staff at the hospital have been working tirelessly and making sacrifices every day to help the local community.

“We are very proud to make to be able to support their wellbeing and the vital work that they do in this way, and we hope this contribution will encourage them to take breaks away from their work environment.”

Jane Ferguson, director of Edinburgh and Lothians Health Foundation, said: “Edinburgh and Lothians Health Foundation was delighted to receive a £3,000 donation from Dandara for Midlothian Community Hospital.

"As the official charity of NHS Lothian, the Foundation has a key role to play in supporting the physical and psychological health and wellbeing of our NHS staff as we move through the various waves of the pandemic, into recovery and beyond.

"We couldn’t do this without the support of organisations like Dandara. We can’t thank them enough for helping us to further enhance the staff wellbeing areas at Midlothian Community Hospital.”