{"id":15461,"date":"2025-04-13T03:31:11","date_gmt":"2025-04-13T03:31:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/15461\/"},"modified":"2025-04-13T03:31:11","modified_gmt":"2025-04-13T03:31:11","slug":"meet-the-alder-hey-security-guard-whose-drawings-are-helping-to-treat-its-young-patients","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/15461\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the Alder Hey security guard whose drawings are helping to \u2018treat\u2019 its young patients"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>For the last six years Shaun Maudsley has been a security guard at Alder Hey, helping to protect and look after the Liverpool children\u2019s hospital as well as its staff and patients.<\/p>\n<p>And when he\u2019s not patrolling the wards or responding to emergencies, the father-of-four has found an additional duty to add to his more formal ones \u2013 cheering up its young patients with drawings of their favourite comic heroes and characters.<\/p>\n<p>Keen artist Shaun, 52, from St Helens, can regularly be found handing out colourful pictures he\u2019s created of Spider-Man or Lilo &amp; Stitch, and more, to the young children receiving treatment.<\/p>\n<p>He says:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf I can bring a bit of cheer to these kids and make them happy, then it gives me a good feeling too.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s nice to put a smile on a few faces, especially when I can see that they\u2019re a bit worried, or a little distressed. They stop crying because they get distracted.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shaun adds: \u201cSome of the patients can be in the hospital for a long time and it means they leave with good memories of the place.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"575\" height=\"1000\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Shaun-with-some-of-his-drawings-1-scaled-e1744362039650.jpg\" alt=\"Shaun Maudsley Art - Alder Hey\" class=\"wp-image-218689\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Shaun has always been creative and is well known among his friends for watercolour landscapes and portraiture.<\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s the comic superheroes and Disney characters drawn in pencil, pen and ink, and marker pens that are his passion.<\/p>\n<p>His talents were first spotted many years ago at Sutton High School where he was a pupil: \u201cThe geographer teacher noticed I was good at drawing maps and copying them,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf I see something I can generally recreate it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI used to draw for my own children, Scooby Doo and Thomas the Tank Engine, which they\u2019d put up on their walls.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cComic book heroes from Marvel and DC Comics are my favourite, Spider-Man, The Hulk, Batman and Deadpool, but over the last few years I have started doing more Disney characters too, like Lilo &amp; Stitch, or Tigger or Eeyore.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shaun uses his art as therapy in the wee small hours: \u201cI don\u2019t sleep a lot, or very well \u2013 I never have \u2013 so using the time to draw fills the lonely hours and means I don\u2019t disturb everyone else,\u201d he smiles.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"663\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tmp_8e038494-c052-4ece-99c3-601ddcdf498b-scaled-e1744362081780.jpeg\" alt=\"Shaun Maudsley Art - Alder Hey\" class=\"wp-image-218693\"\/><\/p>\n<p>He began drawing at Alder Hey during the demolition of the former hospital, when he and colleagues took turns to man the older buildings.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I was sitting in an empty building I\u2019d start drawing.\u00a0 Then later, if I saw a child walking past in Spider-Man PJs, say, I\u2019d give them a picture.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOr if I saw a child with Marvel stuff, I\u2019d give them a picture of the Hulk.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThen every now and then I\u2019d get a call from a nurse to say someone was a fan of a certain Disney or DC character, and ask if I could do them a drawing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve even done pictures of people like Buzz Lightyear and the Lion King, pointing to an intercom button in places around the hospital, and stuff like that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shaun\u2019s now got a stash of pictures which he keeps in his desk or work bag ready, like the superheroes he draws, to race to the rescue and hand them out to hospital patients.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"761\" height=\"1000\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot_20250409_125817_Photos-e1744362074593.jpg\" alt=\"Shaun Maudsley Art - Alder Hey\" class=\"wp-image-218692\"\/><br \/>\nAnd while friends are often saying he should sell his work on well-known websites, he says:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor me it will always be just a hobby.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But he adds: \u201cIt\u2019s nice that my skills and talents have found a good use, and they can bring a little joy.\u00a0 That makes me happy too.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Find all the latest Liverpool news <a href=\"https:\/\/theguideliverpool.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">here<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Find out what\u2019s good up North on our new platform, The Northern Guide.<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>From the best hotels, beauty spots, days out, food and more up North \u2013 visit<a href=\"https:\/\/thenorthernguide.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"> thenorthernguide.com<\/a>\u00a0and follow The Northern Guide on Instagram\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/thenorthernguideuk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">here.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>                <script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the last six years Shaun Maudsley has been a security guard at Alder Hey, helping to protect&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15462,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[10584,748,5554,393,126,4884,179,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-15461","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-aldey-hey-hospital","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-community","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-features","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-liverpool","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114328547173152041","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}