The song is ended, but the melody lingers on….Irving Berlin
In the early hours of Thursday, January 2, 2024 Home Hospice North Lanark lost a friend, a colleague, a leader and a kind and compassionate member of our Team, Jane Henderson. Jane was a community builder, a nurse of some 70 years (retired), a friend and mentor. Soft spoken but when she spoke you listened!!!
In 2012, 4 or 5 ladies from the Almonte Community Coordinators (The Hub) had a vision of starting services in Almonte for palliative and end of life care, later named Hub Hospice. In 2013, Jane joined the Board of Directors of Hub Hospice. She was the first person to make a donation to Hub Hospice, and created their policies and procedures at the time based on accreditation standards.
Jane worked with the founding members to establish palliative and end of life care in Almonte which took many hours of time and commitment. She was instrumental in setting up the organization, getting it established, and making it known to the community.
In 2019, Hub Hospice under the guidance of Jane, Nancy Deschenes and Christine Bois, (all past Chairs of Hub Hospice) completed a name change to better reflect the work and growth of the organization. They expanded the geographical area to include all of North Lanark. The name change reflected what and who we serve, Home Hospice North Lanark.
Jane held many positions on the Board, starting with a Board Director, then onto Vice Chair, Chair and Past Chair. In 2021, Jane advised the Board that she would like to step down as a Director as she felt that she had done what she needed to do to get the organization where it was, and that she felt we were in good hands! Retirement was not a word that existed in Jane’s vocabulary and as the Chair I wondered how long it would take before she called to say she wanted to volunteer again in some capacity!
Well it did not take long before I had a call from Jane, “Jan, I think I would like to take a stab at putting the accreditation process into place, so could you discuss with the Board? I would be happy to coordinate and chair a committee to do this”! So much for retirement! The Board approved the accreditation process with Jane at the helm. A small committee was formed of Jane, Esther Houle (Board Director), myself and Luci Jacobsen ( who we hired to assist with the mountains of paperwork and organization for the accreditation process!).
We started out meeting at the Presbyterian Church, where our office was at the time, but quickly moved the meetings to Jane’s beautiful home in the country. We met there from June 2021 until our final submission to Hospice Palliative Care Ontario (HPCO) in November 2023! Jane’s home and dining room table became the venue for many, many meetings with paperwork strewn across the table in amongst cups of coffee. Her kitchen became a place where we shared stories, meals, cooked lunches, made coffee, laughed and got the work done! I can still hear Jane saying to Esther, Luci and myself “okay girls enough chatter we need to focus!”
In February 2024 I received an email from HPCO to advise that we had been successful in being granted a full 3 year accreditation status! This was Jane’s last hurrah, her greatest wish, her last legacy to Home Hospice North Lanark and in her own words “my greatest and most successful accomplishment of my entire career”!
Jane was insightful, knowledgeable, and compassionate. She knew many people in her professional field as a leader in health care and many whom she mentored. She was a friend to many over the years. When I first became Chair of Home Hospice in 2022, Jane gave me a little gold bell and she said to me “put this out on the table at Board meetings so that you have something to ring to get their attention when they go off topic or talk too long”! I have never used the little gold bell that I can remember and I still carry it in my bag that I take to Board meetings just in case I need to ring the bell!
We have lost someone dear to us, a friend and a mentor, however we will carry on the legacy that Jane started.
Rest in peace Jane, your work here is now done. Home Hospice North Lanark is in good hands and we will make it even better as we move forward.
Jan Watson – Home Hospice North Lanark Board Chair
