Our Story

The Harbour Hospice Story

On 1 July 2018 Hibiscus Hospice, North Shore Hospice and Warkworth Wellsford Hospice merged to form a single charitable trust, Harbour Hospice.

“Harbour” means to shelter and our Hospices are surrounded by safe harbours: the Kaipara Harbour, Mahurangi Harbour, Gulf Harbour and Waitemata Harbour. Hospice services also provide a safe harbour or “shelter” to people with life limiting illness. And in medieval times hospices were places of shelter for travellers on a difficult journey.

As one organisation now we share scarce resources, skill and expertise to keep providing free palliative services to one of the fastest growing areas in New Zealand.

The whole aim of coming together as Harbour Hospice is to direct more resources into our clinical services now and provide for our future communities.

Jan Nichols quote profile
— Jan Nichols, Chief Executive

Hospice services remain free of charge because of the support of our very generous and compassionate communities. Money raised in local communities is used to directly fund Hospice services for that community.

Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.

— Warren Buffett

Our service is growing

Our service is growing

We know we need to grow our services because of population growth and population aging. Our region is one of the fastest growing in New Zealand and we also have one of the highest numbers of older people. The demands for more complex care, more equipment and improved facilities compound this problem.

So this means making changes now. We are planning to build a new purpose built facility at North Shore for patients and families on the existing Shea Terrace site and have begun a capital campaign to raise the funds for this project.

We are also making the most of space in our other facilities by relocating our non- clinical teams to Hibiscus House which when built many years ago, anticipated a growing need for services. The ground floor level of Hibiscus House is being fitted out and more carparks added to house the new teams. Upstairs, there is more space for the growing clinical services.

It’s only through the vision, determination, and generosity of our community champions and supporters who believe passionately in compassionate and skilled end of life care that these changes are happening.

And in particular, we wish to acknowledge the contribution of local contractors who are contributing nearly $170,000 worth of pro bono work to Hospice to provide 27 more car parks for staff and visitors at Hibiscus House.

Please contact us if you have more questions about our services.