VOLUNTEERS play a vital part in a patient’s experience.

The maternity department at Warrington Hospital is looking for mums to help in the antenatal clinic and day unit, the delivery suite and antenatal and postnatal ward.

There are currently 86 volunteers carrying out roles around the hospital.

They sit with patients, answer phones and run activities on the Forget Me Not dementia ward.

Acting assistant matron Sue Benson said: “We are very excited to be launching our volunteer’s scheme on the maternity unit.

“We are looking for women who have experience of being mothers, who will help support our ladies during their visits to the different departments, during their pregnancy and in the postnatal period.”

Volunteers are interviewed and must provide references and pass a disclosure check before they complete a full day’s training.

Volunteer Helen Wright said: “I have been volunteering since January because I wanted the experience as I am looking to go into social work so it helps me with that.”

She takes telephone calls, befriends patients and runs activities.

Sue Milling-Kelly, patient advice and liaison service (PALS) and volunteer coordinator, said: “Volunteers are majorly important. We want to make sure a patients' journey is better than it otherwise would have been.

“We have lonely patients who don’t have anyone to visit them so the volunteers will go and sit with them.

“They will go to the shop for them and get them a paper, some chocolate and a drink. It does make a difference and it relieves the staff.”

Michele Lord, patient experience matron, said: “It is a great opportunity for people who want to go into midwifery, nursing or medical training. “We’ve got people who are looking to get back into the job market again but our core is people who have retired.”

Any mums interested in becoming volunteers are invited to an open afternoon on July 2 from 1pm until 3pm in the antenatal conference room on Croft Wing.