Home parenteral nutrition (HPN) patients need long-term feeding intravenously through a catheter or feeding tube placed into a vein.
The HPN service at Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital, is run by a team of healthcare professionals with a range of skills to help patients who need to receive their food or nutrition in this way.
Our services
Different patients need HPN for different lengths of time. We admit patients who are going to need more long-term parenteral nutrition currently to Ward 16 at the Freeman Hospital. Our specialist team trains patients to manage their own HPN at home.
We make sure that patients are established on HPN and are comfortable enough to use the system at home after their hospital treatment. Depending on their medical condition or surgical plan, patients might need to be admitted to hospital for about three or more weeks.
When patients leave hospital and are stable, our team will see them at follow-up appointments initially frequently, but then every three months.
We also supply patients with contact details so they can access help and advice 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Regional centre
Newcastle is a designated regional centre for HPN in the North East of England. We currently help care for about 150 patients on parenteral nutrition in their own homes across the north east and north Cumbria.
Part of our service is to manage complications surrounding intestinal failure, and we see patients who are referred to us for HPN and intestinal failure surgery from other hospitals in the region.
Audit results
Audits of our service help us to develop and improve services for all patients. We are often involved in audits and research programmes and present these results to national and international clinical conferences. If you like to get involved in research projects, please speak to one of our doctors.
Contact us
For more details about the home parenteral nutrition service, please email:
Lisa Gemmell Lead Specialist Dietitian
Sister Hayley Leyland Nurse Specialist
