Collection of useful resources

These are some of our favourite resources to support you or those you care for through some of those important conversations. Please share with your community and get in touch if you have a great free resource to share. This list is not exhaustive and we plan to update often.

Support

• Guide for Carers  – A resource by Hospice New Zealand with information and support for people caring for someone with a life limiting condition.
• Kete Aronui | Te Ipu Aronui – practical information to help whānau manaaki provide care to adults and kaumātua at the end of their lives
• Sweet Louise – practical, emotional and social care and support for New Zealanders living with incurable breast cancer.
• Support Crew – making it easy to give and get a hand
• CarersNZ – Carers NZ is a national not for profit supporting a network of approximately 490,000 individual carers and supporting organisations. They do not charge a membership fee and fundraise to share our support resources freely with family carers.
• Downloadable Resources – Te Omanga Hospice
• Patient/Whanau Resources – Resources by Palliative Outcomes Initiative (POI) for patients and whanau in multiple languages
• Information for Carers – A general guide for carers from the Ministry of Social Development.
• Palliative Care Quick Guide | Serious Illness Messaging Toolkit
• TimeOut – charity holiday home breaks | Free Bach Accommodation – Helping families of people with an incurable illness to spend time together and create lasting memories

Planning ahead

• Advance care plan – Access to online and hard copy advance care plan documents, as well as how-to guides. Available in English and Te Reo Māori. 
• Wills – making a will and probate – A good guide explaining what a will is and different options for this.
• Making a Will | Public Trust NZ
• Te Hokinga ā Wairua End of Life Service – Find information to help you create and share a personalised plan of what you want to happen when you die.
• Organ Donation New Zealand
• Your Emotional Will 
• Your Ultimate Guide on Digital Death
• Palliative care – talking about dying | Healthify
• Downloadable Resources – Many excellent resources you may find useful when facing the death of a loved one.
• Funerals: The cost of dying – Consumer NZ

Celebrating Life 

•  How do you want your life to be celebrated when you die?
•  The importance of celebrating life milestones
•  Cherished Memories – Helping families celebrate the lives of their elderly loved ones with a beautiful film.

Specialist Palliative Care Services

 
Hospices and hospital palliative care teams provide specialist palliative care. They generally service a particular geographic area. Most public hospitals have a palliative care service. Not all people need specialist palliative care input towards the end of life. Find a hospice below:
 

• Find a Hospice – Hospice New Zealand

Doulas and end-of-life supports

• Cadence Singers – a group of women who seek to bring solace and strength to life’s toughest passages, particularly the pathway of dying.
• End of Life Doulas – A directory of end of life/death doulas in NZ.

Post-death care

• myTrove – A website supported by NZ internal affairs that allows you to inform multiple organisations of a death. 
• Manaaki Mats – Safe, simple, specialist and effective cooling resource for deathcare
• Arranging the funeral – A good summary of some of the legal obligations when arranging a funeral
• Tangihanga | Te Ipu Aronui – Practical advice and around organising Tangihanga
• A death in the family – Advice for whānau
• Funeral Grant – Help with some of the funeral costs of someone who has died
• Urutapu Funeral Services – Providing sustainable, affordable and culturally sensitive funeral services

Loss and Grief

• After a suicide –  practical information and guidance for people bereaved by suicide
• Skylight Trust – support for children, young people, and their whānau to navigate through tough times
• Grief Centre – loss and grief support to youth, adults, families or whānau experiencing any form of significant loss.
• KidsHealth NZ – a guide to bereavement reactions of children & young people by age group
• Downloadable Resources – excellent resources from Te Omanga Hospice, particularly addressing grief and how to speak to children about death and dying.
• Dying For Beginners with Dr Kathyrn Mannix – Many people have limited firsthand experience with the process of dying, which can significantly affect our emotional and spiritual responses to the loss of our loved ones and influence how we approach our mortality. 
• Funerals: The cost of dying – Consumer NZ – This eye-opening resource could be a good incentive to start exploring your options regarding funerals and burials, and even a prompt to start conversations with your loved ones, too.

Tangata Whenua

• https://terangikahupapa.co.nz/ : Te Rangikahupapa Funeral Services. We provide a space of aroha, manaakitanga and wairuatanga during the time of tangi. Proudly New Zealand owned and operated, our whanau work to support you and your whanau and maintain the simplicity of grieving.
• Urutapu Funeral Services – Providing sustainable, affordable, and culturally sensitive funeral services Urutapu Funeral Services.Urutapu offers a natural alternative option that provides sustainable and culturally appropriate funeral services, utilising woven kopaki tupapaku (flax caskets).
• https://www.tearairesearchgroup.net/  Te Ārai Palliative Care and End of Life Research Group. We are an equity-focused palliative care and end of life research group who work in a partnership model between Māori and non-Māori with support of the Te Ārai Kahui Kaumātua (Elder Advisors).
• https://www.teipuaronui.co.nz/ Te Ipu Aronui. Our site is to support Māori whānau (families) to provide care to adults and kaumātua (older people) at end of life, as well as take care of whānau at the same time.

Other directories

• The BIG LIST — The Groundswell Project
• Support Directories – support directories for Te Tai Tokerau and Waitemata regions

Compassionate Communities

• Good Life, Good Death, Good Grief – Scotland’s compassionate communities initiative
• The Groundswell Project – Excellent resources for creating a compassionate community
• Compassionate Communities – Pallium Canada
• Six Compassionate Superpowers – Hospice UK
• Dementia Friends – Alzheimers New Zealand – Free Online Course 

Interesting articles

• Talking about the Queen and death, with children – an eye opening article
• What happens as we die? – an excellent TED talk by Kathryn Mannix