Georgia’s first hospice for kids opened

A hospice for chronically and terminally ill children has opened in Tbilisi. The country’s first facility of the kind, it will provide 1) around-the-clock care to 10 kids at any given time, 2) out-patient services catering to children and their parents during the day, and 3) at-home care. Importantly, it will charge no fees.

Business, state and individual donors have, “unprecedentedly”, joined efforts to give their support to a cause so charitable and noble, said Georgia’s First Lady Maka Chichua said at the opening ceremony.

The construction of the hospice was launched in October 2015, upon initiative of the Open Society Georgia Foundation and with initial financial support from the Evex Medical Corporation and Georgia president’s reserve fund. All in all, over a million laris was donated to the construction project, as hundreds of donors, individuals and businesses, stepped up to contribute.The idea to create a hospice for children stemmed from a 2013 research that showed that over 800 Georgian kids aged 0 to 18 years needed palliative care every year.