Our volunteers provide non-medical support to those with life-limiting illness, primarily as part of a team of professionals and volunteers that includes the nurses, social workers, home health aides, and chaplain – all from a Medicare-certified hospice in our service area. We contract with MaineHealth Care at Home to provide the Medicare-required volunteer component.

CFHV volunteers are trained for their work in a 30-hour course offered at least once annually. The training emphasizes those skills, including active listening, that go into being a caring, nonjudgmental presence in the lives of those we serve.

Depending on the needs of a patient or family, a volunteer might bring mostly practical support to a case, in the form of running errands, providing occasional transportation, researching community resources, or giving a caregiver respite for several hours a week. In some cases, the volunteer’s role may be best described as that often filled by an attentive friend or neighbor, someone who brings emotional support to patient or caregivers. Volunteers can also offer friendly support and companionship by sitting with a patient, holding their hand, or reading to them. Most of all, volunteers offer a caring and listening presence and comforting support to hospice patients and their families.

Coastal Family Hospice Volunteers offers a variety of bereavement services, all of which are open to the general public.

Our bereavement mailings are sent over a 13-month period to those grieving a loss. The first six mailings arrive monthly, then at slightly longer intervals. If you would like to receive our mailings, at no charge, you may call us at 207-230-0042 for more information.

Our volunteers are trained to provide one-to-one bereavement support. That support may take the form of meetings over a cup of tea or coffee, telephone conversations, or quiet companionship.

Coastal Family Hospice Volunteers also offers Bereavement Support Groups of varying kinds throughout the year.  These groups offer an opportunity to express feelings in a safe and confidential setting with others who are experiencing similar losses.  Groups are co-facilitated by local professionals and trained hospice volunteers. We offer eight-week support groups, open to the public, but requiring pre-registration.  We also offer an on-going monthly drop-in support group open to anyone coping with the loss of a loved one.

Our annual Service of Faith and Remembrance, held in the spring, is a nondenominational service that includes a tribute to family members and friends who have died recently, or in the more distant past.