Florida Hospital leaders are excited to announce the opening of the Bartch Transplant House, a new home at the Orlando campus that will provide crucial services to transplant patients and their families.
Each year, more than 135 patients and their families must travel more than 50 miles for each doctor’s appointment. The average patient has 40 appointments and stays in the hospital for two to three weeks. For some transplant patients, the hospital stay is months.
The Bartch Transplant House will provide affordable accommodations, and allow families to cook their own meals, reduce expenses such as gas, and stay in a peaceful setting near the hospital.
The three-story, craftsman-style Bartch Transplant House — named after the family who made a significant contribution to the project — is modeled after the original Florida Hospital, opened in 1908. It is 21,000 square feet, and features 24 private rooms, a sprawling porch overlooking Lake Winyah, a kitchen, laundry facility, and common spaces. Transplant patients’ families will be able to stay in the house in upcoming weeks.
“Transplant patients and their families are under great stress, not just because of their illness, but also because of the travel required and length of hospital stays,” said Barry Friedman, senior administrative director of the Transplant Institute. “Our patients need extensive support from family and friends, and the Bartch Transplant House will help relieve some of these burdens and the financial stress associated with treatment and recovery.”
For more than 40 years, Florida Hospital has been committed to saving lives through the Transplant Institute, which offers kidney, liver, kidney/pancreas, lung, and heart transplants.
It is one of the nation’s oldest and largest kidney transplant programs, with more than 160 kidney transplants performed annually. Since the program’s inception in 1973, Florida Hospital surgeons have performed nearly 4,000 kidney transplants.
“The emotional and physical support of family and friends is vital to a patient’s healing,” said Robert Metzger, M.D., medical director of the Institute’s kidney transplant program. “The Bartch Transplant House is a priceless resource, not just for our patients, but for all of central Florida.”
Adventist Health System | February 2017
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