A NURSING service is launching its first county-specific nursing appeal following £510,000 of investment from Dorset Primary Care Trust.

Marie Curie Dorset is holding a welcome event at a Dorchester pub today to promote the appeal and to urge fundraisers to help it to match the ‘amazing’ boost in funding.

The money from Dorset PCT, which must be matched by the charity, recognises the growing demand for the nursing service to care for cancer sufferers and terminally ill people in their own homes.

The launch will be held at The Royal Oak pub in High West Street at 11am.

Members of the public are invited to pop in for refreshments, meet the charity’s nurses and have a chat about the nursing service.

Marie Curie nurse Catherine Kelly, who is based in east Dorset but travels all over the county for her job, is the face of the new nursing appeal.

She said: “It’s wonderful to be able to promote the charity that I work for.”

Julia Chapman, the charity’s fundraising manager for the west, said it was Marie Curie Cancer Care’s first local nursing appeal in Dorset.

She said: “The charity has been campaigning for increased investment in end of life care and with increased awareness of the charity’s nursing service, demand is growing.

“Dorset Primary Care Trust has commissioned more of the Marie Curie Nursing Service for 2010/11.This is an absolutely amazing news for nursing care in Dorset, given the economic climate.

“Because we’re 50/50 funded it means Marie Curie Cancer Care needs to raise £510,000 to fund the service this year.

“We’re not starting from a blank canvas because we had fundraising plans anyway but we’ve probably got a £200,000 shortfall.

“We’re looking for support groups to do regular events for us. We want to invite members of the public along to the launch, find out more about our nursing appeal, meet the nurses and hopefully get inspired to raise money for us.”

She added: “We’ve got about 49 nurses at the moment, who are mainly on bank hours.

“The money will be used to give them contracted hours so that can provide more care to people in their own homes. At the moment they’re caring for eight to 10 patients a night, we’re now hoping to double that.

“We’re hoping the PCT is going to give us the same support for 2011/13 and if they do that we’ll be looking to recruit more nurses.”

Last year, the charity’s nurses provided more than 31,000 hours of care to people with cancer and other terminal illnesses in Dorset, almost twice as much as the previous year.