New Year Honours: Newtownabbey nurse's BEM is 'recognition for all the outreach volunteers'
A nurse from Newtownabbey has detailed her experiences supporting homeless people across greater Belfast after being included on the New Year Honours list.
Cathy McCoy, who is the Clinical Services Manager for Emergency Medicine at Antrim Area Hospital in the Northern Health and Social Services Trust, received the BEM for voluntary services to homeless people in Belfast.
The Brambles resident has been volunteering with Reaching Out Homeless and Community Support for five years, describing it as a “very humbling experience.”
Speaking to the Newtownabbey Times, Cathy explained: “The BEM isn’t an individual honour. It’s a team of us and this recognition is for my team. We work exceptionally hard, making up the food packages and hampers for people who are living on the streets.
"A group of 10 of us made up approximately 70 hampers for people this Christmas, people who don’t have anything. It’s a very humbling experience. We also got toys for children. It’s sad to think that there are people who can’t afford food or toys for their children at Christmas. We’re trying to make their situation better.”
Cathy who works in the Emergency Department at Antrim Area Hospital, stated: "We set up a table every Monday night in Tomb Street and there could be up to 60 people coming to us, with many of them waiting there for us before we have even arrived, because they know the service we provide, some maybe haven’t had anything to eat for a number of days.
"Working in the ED, you don’t get to see where people you’re looking after are being discharged to, and it’s a worry. Plus, with my work environment, it’s very busy and you can’t get a chat with the patients who have addiction issues. But, now volunteering with the outreach team, I get to spend time hearing the people’s stories and offering them support.
"Some of the stories are so sad. In most of the cases something awful has happened to make them the way they are. As a community, people need to realise that homeless people are from the community and they deserve care and compassion. Ending up on the streets can happen to anyone.
"A lot of agencies have tried to help them in the past, but we can’t give up on them.”