THE chaplain at Margate's Queen Mother Hospital is saying goodbye to a demanding job after 17 years. The Rev Sister Elizabeth Shearcroft, better known as Sister Elizabeth, is leaving on March 31 and moving to Cumbria where she will be assistant parish priest at Kendal parish church.

Sister Elizabeth, 45, a Church Army officer who is also ordained, has been on call day and night for all things spiritual. Her work ranges from the joyful to the harrowing and exhausting.

She said: "It can be anything from affirmation and reassurance, to officiating at staff weddings and baptising babies, and through to real trauma and tragedy.

“The nice side is when you baptise a baby no bigger than a bag of sugar and seven years later the mother stops you in Smith’s and asks if you remember this healthy tall child as a little shrimp.

“Being a vicar will involve doing much the same kind of work as here, but in a less intensive way.”

Anyone who has ever worked with Sister Elizabeth is invited to her farewell party on Thursday, March 21, at the hospital social club from 12 noon to 2pm.