Planning continues
for a Ronald McDonald House to be built within a new stateof-the-art,
150,000-square-foot women’s and children’s unit on the fifth and sixth floors of St. John’s
Hospital. Construction for the new unit will begin in early 2008, after the new Patient Tower opens. In addition to the 8,000-square-foot,
up to 10-bedroom Ronald McDonald House on the 6th floor, a new 42-bed single-family-unit neonatal intensive care unit will be
constructed on the 5th floor.
This project has been a labor of love for all involved. We are
grateful for our partnership with St. John’s, particularly the support and
kindness of Vice President of Women’s & Children’s Services, Susanne Miller;
and Vice President of Public Affairs and St. John’s Foundation for Community
Health, Mike Peters. During the past two years, St. John’s has carefully analyzed the
needs of the programs and departments for the new Patient Tower, benefiting from the expertise of a consultant who has assisted
in ensuring that projected growth can be accommodated. The new timing
for St. John’s Ronald McDonald House has been part of this
process.
Located next to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, the Ronald
McDonald House will help families of sick children and high-risk maternity patients with both overnight stays and daytime visits,
providing meals through our Family Dinner Program, laundry facilities, napping areas, e-mail access, quiet
rooms for breast feeding and many more homelike services hosted by staff and volunteers who truly care. The most needed and appreciated benefit of all will be shared between our families, giving each other encouragement, hope and comfort and sharing their true understanding of having an ill or injured child.
Preliminary architectural plans for the new Ronald House are nearing completion, thanks to the generosity of