Who We Are

Very Special Kids provides holistic palliative care for children and young people with life-limiting conditions, and tailored support for their families – through life, death and bereavement. Our integrated approach includes emotional, clinical and practical support to help improve quality of life and create positive, lasting memories. 

We understand every child’s experience with a life-limiting condition is unique, and every family requires tailored support specific to their family’s journey. As Victoria’s only children’s hospice, our holistic services support more than 850 families across Victoria. 

Our multidisciplinary approach includes clinical care, counselling, sibling support, bereavement support and community activities. We service the physical, mental and emotional needs of the children and young people in our care, and their families, so they are always supported in the way they need it most. 

Our children’s hospice was the first in Australia and remains the only children’s hospice in Victoria. The hospice was built in 1996 and has provided specialised care to thousands of children and young people with life-limiting conditions. Helping to ensure, every child has the right to the best quality of life, no matter how long or short their life may be, and every family is comprehensively supported during their most difficult journey. 

As one of the leaders in palliative care for children and young people, we recognise the importance of wider community awareness of illness, death and grief, and the role that a family’s support network plays in their ability to cope and heal. We advocate for better policies and education so that society can better deal with, and talk about, life and death, creating more supportive communities for sick children and bereaved families. 

Very Special Kids rely on the generosity of our community to ensure seriously-ill children, young people and their families don’t have to endure their difficult journey alone. Our empathetic and dedicated supporters are the reason sick children and their families have access to comfort, respite and the very best care in the most difficult times. 

Very Special Kids have a calendar of engaging fundraising events, as well as several programs, including corporate and workplace giving, leaving a bequest and our regular giving program. 

Very Special Kids welcomes people of all backgrounds and respects that the families we support are different in many ways including country of birth, ethnicity, culture, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, religion and ability.

Very Special Kids is proud to display the Registered Charity Tick to highlight our charitable status through The Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission’s Charity Register.