Pandaw Ward - U Hla Tun Foundation Mandalay Hospice

U Hla Tun is now aged 81 and regarded as Burma’s leading chartered accountant. He is also a widely respected Burmese philanthropist. After loosing his only daughter to leukaemia in 1997 he became inspired by the hospice work of Dame Cecily Saunders the founder of the St Christopher Hospice in London. U Hla Tun has taken the Dame Cecily model and applied it to Burma building three hospices in Rangoon, Mandalay and a third under construction at Taunggyi. U Hla Tun has mostly financed the construction and endowment of these projects from his own resources. Now the movement has grown to such an extent he needs outside help.

Since opening the hospices have cared for over 1200 terminally ill patients of whom over 1000 have passed on. Given the poverty in which many families find themselves now in Burma, many people can no longer afford to care for the elderly and ill. The Hospices offer a clean and safe place for such people to spend their final days well cared for by qualified medical teams. Four ontologists, seven physicians, three matrons and 19 nurses take real care of the terminally ill. There is an intensive care unit. The Foundation also takes care of burial rites for all denominations. Each hospice is set in five acres of landscaped gardens and there are Buddhist prayer rooms and Christian chapels. Cash assistance is given to orphans and the bereaved. In 2005 Pandaw River Cruises sponsored the construction of the Pandaw Ward - an intensive care unit for the Mandalay hospice.

Project cost to date: $50,000