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Pittsburgh Tribune Review

Family House comforts, strengthens patients
By Chris TogneriTRIBUNE-REVIEWSunday, July 6, 2008

Julie Trahan was scared and homesick. She had not eaten solid food in 18 months. Her weight plummeted to just under 70 pounds. Several organs were failing, and she was too weak to get out of the car.

But as her mother went inside Family House Shadyside and signed papers clearing the way for an indefinite stay in Pittsburgh, Trahan, 28, of Rodman, N.Y., got a good feeling. "From where I sat in the vehicle, I could see little lamps and paintings through the windows," she said. "I thought, 'What have I stepped into? This is going to be good.'

"I kept thinking about Christmas for some reason," she said. "I thought, 'Well, if I'm still here, I'll dream about walking down the stairs to a Christmas tree.' We would have a huge tree. I imagined everyone around it, decorating it, putting presents under it. "And then I wouldn't have to miss home."

That's the goal at Family House. Now in its 25th year of providing shelter and moral support to critically ill patients and caregivers who travel to seek treatment in Pittsburgh, Family House is expanding. Officials recently began building a fourth facility, in Oakland.

Family House officials said they aim to create a homelike environment so patients can focus on fighting their illnesses, and to charge as little as possible. Rooms start at $30 for a single and run to $50 for a suite for four people. Prices at nearby hotels are two to three times higher.
The nonprofit was founded in 1983 by doctors and civic leaders who said they were tired of watching patients' caregivers sleep in chairs in hospital waiting rooms. Donations and volunteers help to keep it running.

For critically ill patients such as Trahan, Family House is a blessing. She was diagnosed with post-viral gastroparesis, which prevented her from digesting food. She arrived in Pittsburgh on April 30 to await stomach, small bowel and pancreas transplants.

Trahan did not know where she was on the waiting list, only that she was close enough to the top that University of Pittsburgh Medical Center officials needed her nearby.

She was called in June 25, underwent transplant surgery and is recovering at UPMC Montefiore. "She's amazed the doctors and nurses with how great she looks," Mary Trahan said of her daughter last week. "When she came out of the surgery, she said she's hungry."

Julie Trahan still faces a long and difficult road. She does not know how long she will be in Pittsburgh, only that when she is well enough, she will move from her hospital bed back to Family House for at least six months so doctors can closely monitor her recovery.
Because of the uncertainty around the surgery, her dad and sister stayed behind in Rodman.

Trahan misses them, but said she has found a family here. "You end up acting and doing things like you would in your home," she said. "We have puzzle night in the library, and that's what I used to do with my sister back home. They have built this place for us -- lonely people that are sick and need a place to stay. "This is scary, but everyone here understands. Somewhere else, I'd be isolated and alone. Here, all of that melts away."

Theresa Lewis, 48, and her mother, Beverly Lewis, 68, agree that staying at Family House has helped them navigate difficult times. They travel to Family House every few weeks from Norman, Okla., while Beverly Lewis receives breast cancer treatment at UPMC Presbyterian and Shadyside. "I was willing to go anywhere in the world, but staying at Family House is like staying with an extended family," Theresa Lewis said. "You can talk to strangers here because you're all going through the same thing."

"It's a place of hope," Beverly Lewis said. "People come in here fighting for their lives."
Theresa Lewis said she and her mother are their family's only living members. In 1982, a plane crash in New Mexico killed her father and two brothers. "We're all going to die, but she can't die until I go because I'm the only one left," Theresa Lewis said. "I tell her that the day I die, she can go the next day."

There are three Family Houses in Pittsburgh -- two in Oakland, on Neville Avenue and McKee Place, and one in Shadyside, where Trahan stays, across the street from UPMC Shadyside. The facilities have a total of 115 rooms.

Demand is high: The facilities run at an average occupancy rate of 93 percent, and officials must turn away more than half of those seeking accommodations, Executive Director Christie Knott said.

To meet demand, the fourth facility is being built on the top four floors of the University of Pittsburgh's University Club building in Oakland. That will add 45 guest rooms and suites, Knott said. The $4 million project is being paid for with donations -- half has been raised -- and should be completed by February.

After the expansion, the "turn-away rate" will drop from 54 percent to 28 percent, Knott said.
"That feels more in line with our mission," Knott said. "Turning people away -- it's heartbreaking."

Trahan is thankful she was not turned away. Before her surgery, Trahan said the wait for healthy organs was made easier by the staff and guests at Family House. "In a hotel, I'd be the sick one," she said. "People would stare at me. Here, there are whole days when I don't even think about it. When you're sick, sometimes you just need comfort. It takes your mind away from the aches and pains."

More than comfort, the supportive atmosphere at Family House might actually give patients a better chance of surviving, said Holly Lorenz, vice president of Patient Care Services and chief nursing officer at UPMC Presbyterian. "Cancer patients that have a strong faith or a strong family support system, their outcome, their response to treatment is much stronger than those who don't," she said. "I'm sure that there is that kind of effect going on at Family House."

The 12 full-time and 22 part-time staff members at the three homes try not to become emotionally involved with guests, said Kay Bebenek, manager of the Shadyside facility.
But that's not always possible, Bebenek said. For example, she recalled the day Trahan arrived.
"Meeting her -- it kind of choked me up," Bebenek said. "I had to look away. I try not to get close, but how can you help it? I admire these people. Everyone who comes in here is fighting for their life. Yeah, we lose sometimes. But we have many success stories here."

Even before her surgery, when Trahan did not know if the organs she needed to live would become available, she said Family House had given her the strength to imagine a future.
"When I'm married and have children," she said, "I want my children to see this place that gave me hope and the will to carry on, the place that cared for their mother when she needed it most.
"I think that will be a beautiful day."