HOME VOLUNTEERS: A PRACTICAL SUPPORT Home volunteers enter the patient’s family either on its request or on the team’s suggestion, after careful evaluation. It is very important for volunteers to realize, “ from within”, the family’s all possible troubles or needs and to report them to the team in order to intervene.( Very often, those who are in greatest need are ashamed to ask for help). A volunteer helps the patient in the care and hygiene of the body ( he/she makes the bed, helps the patient to get dressed or to bath if it is possible) and in his nutrition .( he/she can cooperate to cook, and feed the patient, using those little tricks that make meals more pleasant). Another important task is the volunteer’s help in moving the patient, which must be done with the doctor’s assent and following the nurse’s advice.

If the patient can go out, the volunteer walks with him when he has to undergo examinations, or treatment, or for any other reason, or he/she can go on errands for him ( going shopping, to the chemistry, to the post office etc.)
Volunteers play an important role at death time, when the patient’s relatives, though faced with a “waited for” moment, have not often the clearness of mind that is required to cope with the practical side of the situation. They can cooperate, getting through the funeral service, the necessary papers and, later on, the pension claim, etc.