DONATIONS have been flooding in for a collection which has been organised for the bereavement service at Forth Valley Royal Hospital.

Hundreds of items have been given to the women and children's unit as part of a project from Tesco in Alloa, which hopes to offer practical support to families coping with the loss of a child.

It is helping to furnish two delivery suites and two quiet antenatal rooms at the Larbert facility, in a bid to make them more comfortable.

In addition, it is also taking in items of clothing for youngsters who are unwell, along with special burial pieces, and will facilitate the purchase of memorial ornaments.

Melanie Mitchell, community champion at the outlet, said: "The response to the collection has been amazing.

"Colleagues in the store have bought items from the wish-list displayed and there has also been some fundraising taking place to allow us to buy more items."

The initiative kicked off earlier this year and is building on work previously carried out for the neonatal unit, which saw a collection for clothes, knitted items and memorial pieces.

For the project, Tesco has been working closely the hospital as many of the items are restricted due to infection control.

Members of staff have been purchasing and handing in a range of goods, such as water glasses, flasks, blankets, bedding, mugs, colouring-in books and more.

Meanwhile, customers of the store have been busy hand-making clothing using knitting and crocheting patterns that have been handed out at the local branch.

Already, 34 hats, 26 cardigans, eight pairs of mitts, 15 pairs of bootees/socks, four blankets, three burial wraps and a burial dress have been kindly given.

There are also plans to fundraise for copper leaves that can be engraved with the name of a child and placed on a memorial, where they will stay for a year before being returned to parents.

Melanie said: "We'll buy and deliver the other items that will be needed in the next few weeks, including storage cupboards for the antenatal rooms, and when that's done we'll move on to raising the money for the copper leaves for the memorial tree.

"We also handed out well over 100 pattern bundles to our shoppers and the items being handed in are beautiful.

"We have different bundles available depending on whether the person wants to knit something for a premature baby in the neonatal unit, or if they'd rather knit some of the tiny burial items that are desperately needed.

"Patterns are still available from the customer service desk and there is no time limit for the handmade items as they are constantly needed – as long as anything is handed in we'll make sure it gets to the unit."