A CHARITY is appealing for volunteers to help keep a vital lifeline going.
Berkshire Vision, which helps those who have vision impairments, launched a befriending service during the first lockdown, to ensure the people it helps stay in touch by phone.
It says this has had a hugely positive impact on its members, with more than 400 people receiving regular telephone calls.
This allowed the charity to provide a welfare check, monitoring for changes in vulnerability and give support with issues of accessing food and medication during lockdown, as well as, clearly, reducing social isolation through befriending.
Bekrhisre Vision says that by July 4, 2020 – the end of the first lockdown measures – more than 4,239 calls had been made, totalling more than 81,084 minutes.
Last year, the service grew, and provided more than 97,000 minutes of befriending calls.
Recognising the success of the service, and looking to cope with the increased demand, Berkshire Vision is appealing for people to join in as callers.
Due to the enormous success of the service and increased demand Berkshire Vision continued to offer telephone befriending and last year more 97,000 minutes of telephone befriending calls were made, which Berkshire Vision says helped to reduce isolation and loneliness, which is often made worse by sight loss.
One of the people who benefited from the calls is Ruby, who said: “Having Mary call me each week made a huge difference in a troubled time. Whoever thought up the befriending service deserves a medal,”
Ruby and Mary finally got to meet in person in the summer of 2021 and have now built a long-lasting friendship.
And one of the callers, David, said: “It’s great to catch up with people regularly, telephone befriending has helped me as much as it has helped the people I have been supporting”
With the pandemic continuing into 2022, and with winter months still ahead, the requests to continue the service from members, many of whom are vulnerable and are choosing to stay at home, and volunteers has been overwhelming and Berkshire Visions says its telephone befriending service is as important as ever.
It welcomed calls from people who have an hour or two to spare each week to call one of its members and have a chat.
A spokesperson for the charity said: “You will discover how rewarding it is to build a new friendship and help them feel less isolated.”
For more details, or to volunteer, call Berkshire Vision on 0118 987 2803, or email: info@berkshirevision.org.uk
