Peter Pitcher has been nursing for 40 years.  He has worked widely in palliative care in a range of settings including hospital, community and hospice.  Working in both the NHS and the independent sector Peter has spent many years at patients’ bedsides working his way up to senior management positions both in palliative care and acute health care settings.  

He studied for an MSc in Psychosocial Palliative Care at Southampton University taking a special interest in bereavement care.  He has taught widely on bereavement care, communication skills and other topics related to working with the dying and bereaved.  Writing credits include two book chapters on pain and hospital based palliative care written in partnership with colleagues.  

Peter served as Chair to the Cancer Network Specialist Palliative Care Group for three years.  He is also a psychodynamic counsellor and, having retired from nursing three years ago, now works as a volunteer counsellor in a low cost counselling service and has a small private practice.  

Peter was the founder of Mountbatten Players, an amateur theatre group established 30 years ago with staff at Countess Mountbatten House, now Mountbatten Hampshire.  Mountbatten Players has gone from strength to strength producing major theatre productions which support the work of the hospice.