The Bi-annual Robin Clarke Memorial Lecture 14th May 2009

This Biannual Lecture is held in honour of the late Robin Clarke MC, JP, DL, FCIS, and the Chairman of St Catherine’s Hospice from its opening in 1983 to 1989. Under his guidance, the Hospice opened as a 14 bed unit providing inpatient care for the local community. Later, a Specialist Community Team and a Day Hospice unit were added to improve patient services.

In 2009, Eve Gerrard delivered a lecture on Hope and Palliative Care on 14th May, examining the importance of hope in palliative care and the difficulties associated with maintaining hope in the dying patient and yet respecting the patient's autonomy.

Eve Garrard, who is currently Visiting Fellow in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Manchester, recently retired as Senior Lecturer at Keele University in its Centre for Professional Ethics. Much of her teaching has been in applied ethics, mostly to palliative care health professionals.  She has done research and published in other areas of ethical issues, including ideas of evil and forgiveness, moral theory, applied ethics, euthanasia, research and palliative care ethics. She has co-edited a book on moral philosophy and the Holocaust and is currently working on a book on forgiveness.

In 2007, the  Robin Clarke Memorial Lecture was held on 17th May, entitled Death, Dying and Personal Choice.  This was a lively and thought-provoking look at the issues surrounding respecting personal choice;  equity, preferences & beliefs; the assisted suicide debate; and resourcing palliative care in the future.  The lecture was delivered by Bobbie Farsides,  Professor of Clinical & Biomedical Ethics at Brighton & Sussex Medical School.