Congratulations to Gift of Life Donor Program, the organ-and-tissue-transplant organization, which broke ground on Oct. 18th on the Gift of Life Family House. Located at 4th and Callowhill, the 30-room, hotel-like facility will offer temporary lodging and support services to transplant patients and families who travel more than 30 miles to Philadelphia for medical care.

If all goes as planned, the house will open next October.

God knows how badly a place like this is needed. Philly might offer top-notch treatment at a number of high-end medical facilities. But if you're an out-of-towner and need to stay here more than a night or two to receive your treatment, hotel costs can send you to the poor house. 

Especially if you're a transplant patient, where treatment is both intense and long-term - post-op care alone can require up to 50 visits.

The Family House will allow transplant patients and their families to bed down in a place that's actually affordable: a night's stay will cost $40, a fraction of the rates charged at Center City hotels, even if you're a whiz at snatching up cheap rooms on Orbitz.  The fee covers a room that sleeps up to 4 people, meals, van transportation to and from hospitals, parking, on-site fitness center, internet access, services of a staff social worker and who-knows-what other amenities the Gift of Life people will dream up between now and opening day. 

"For those families who cannot afford the $40 fee, we have established a Family Fund where contributions will offset the portion of the nightly fee that cannot be covered by the family," House director Debra Roberts tells me. "Bottom line, no family will ever be turned away because of their inability to pay."
 
Can you imagine how huge this is for people dealing with serious, chronic illness - that kind that keeps you out of work? The average hotel rate in Philadelphia runs anywhere from $125-$150 per night.  Meals, parking, valet parking, tolls, gas - all of it quickly adds up to $200-$300 per day, depending on the number of family members who need to be near the patient.

No wonder bankruptcy is rampant among the chronically ill. The best insurance plan in the world won't cover all the incidental costs of staying alive.

If the idea of a family house sounds familiar, it's because the concept was born here when Ronald McDonald House opened its doors 35 years ago to out-of-town families of pediatric patients who needed a place "to have a cup of tea," as its heroic and marvelous founder, oncologist Audrey Evans, once described the need to me.

There are now 288 Ronald McDonald houses around the world, providing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of complementary lodging, hospitality, social services and TLC to families needing a welcoming port in the difficult storm of childhood illness. 

Here's hoping that Gift of Life Family House, the first of its kind for transplant patients, sparks a similar mission around the globe.

To learn more, or to donate the home's building fund, go to www.GiftOfLifeFamilyHouse.org.