Teddies For Loving Care

It was that experience which got them thinking just how traumatic the experience had been, and they wondered how children coped when facing similarly stressful experiences. Talking amongst themselves, a fellow Freemason came up with the idea of giving a comforting item to children who are rushed into hospital and the idea grew from there.

Since founding the Teddies for Loving Care Scheme, 47 regional programmes across England and Wales have since adopted it, with in excess of 3.5 million teddies donated nationally in that time.

Derbyshire joined the scheme in 2004 and have funded and distributed over 72,500 teddies (Sept 2024) across the county.

The scheme is very simple, we supply teddies free of charge to Emergency Departments for the medical staff to give, at their discretion, to children who are in distress and where the medical staff feel that a teddy to cuddle will help alleviate the stress and assist them in treating the child. The teddy is for the child to keep. There are some lovely stories of the nurses using them to demonstrate procedures such as injections, plastering, bandaging and they have found this really useful in placating and calming the child.

The bears are specially made to health & safety standards and are approved for use in medical situations. They are almost entirely funded by donations from Freemasons and their Lodges. The donations are held by the Provincial Grand Charity.

I have a team of 4 volunteers that distribute the bears and ensure the hospitals have sufficient supplies. We currently support hospitals in Derby, Chesterfield, Burton upon Trent, Darley Dale and Buxton.