Advisory Board

The advisory board was very interesting last night. There are about 15 people on the board and the architects' plans were so impressive. This firm specializes in building hospitals. This one is going to be so nice, peaceful and wonderful for patients, doctors and families. The next step is taking it to the state which they said is about a 1.5 year speed-project. All the rooms are private, there are playrooms, activity rooms, and teen rooms galore. Every room has a huge media center and sleep area for parents. We now sleep in the ICU and step-down on a pull out chair which I felt so privledged about. UCSF became a family friendly hospital a couple years ago which has benefited all. It is easier for the kids to have parents present, since they are able to do a lot of the minor care and soothing and can gauge their childrens demeanor for doctors. There are three garden terraces off the floors for the kids to roam. It will be so nice. The families have been working on integrating a lot of their ideas with the architects and it was neat to see their opinions being set in motion. We are working on doing monthly brunches for parents in the hospital but need to find donors and figure out liguistics. Next month we will discuss our goals and break down into sub-committees. I really want to be involved in family-to-family support which doesn't really exist right now.