Volunteers at Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (MPFT) play an important role in making a difference to the lives of those in their community, expanding their own knowledge while providing support to our staff.

MPFT volunteers play key roles and support a variety of services across the Trust, such as libraries, inclusion, peer support, peer mentoring and their coffee shop to mention just a few.

More recently our volunteers provided a crucial and amazing service to the community through the pandemic by providing essential support to vaccination centres.

The key benefits we find for volunteering at MPFT is the huge variety of roles there are in clinical and non-clinical settings. It increases the awareness of what is involved in delivering health and social care services. It can also support people in their career journey or even service users that may volunteer as part of their journey to recovery.

Zara Parrish, Operational Lead for a vaccination centre said: “The vaccination programme would not have been as successful as it has without the dedication of our volunteers. 

“We have seen volunteers come forward from all kinds of backgrounds including folk who are retired, those who may have been furloughed due to the pandemic or just wanted to help out in their spare time. 

“The vaccination rollout hasn’t just been about clinical practice, we very quickly realised we needed people to support our patients through the journey and having people step forward into volunteering roles has enabled us to enhance the patient’s journey, making it a safe and pleasurable experience for all.”

Stuart Middleton is also an Operational Lead for a vaccination centre. He said: “We must not forget our army of volunteers, who too came from all sorts of professional backgrounds, these were the real heroes of the vaccine programme standing outside (week after week) in all weathers wind, rain, snow (we even had some sun on could of days) helping to direct and reassure our service users.

“Quite simply without our many volunteers we couldn't have operated the site in the way that it was.

“I know for some the experiences at the vaccination centre helped to reinvigorate their passion for a career in healthcare and for others they found something they didn’t know they loved and subsequently found a new career in healthcare whether it be with MPFT or a partner NHS organisations.

“For me if there’s any good to come out of the pandemic this is it, patients were welcomed, reassured and treated with the upmost compassion & dignity during my time at the centre."

At MPFT we support and embrace the help that volunteers give us and are always welcome of any time and support people are willing to give. If you feel a volunteering role is for you then please get in touch at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.