A patient living in our Waterford CT Care location had a GYN malignancy and required surgery.  Due to surgical complexity and patient underlying conditions, it was determined that the best location for this surgery should be New Haven.  The patient and her husband were elderly and the early morning arrival to the OR suite was challenging due to travel distance.  After several surgical dates were canceled, the nurse partnered with the team social worker and a full assessment was done.  It was determined that the early morning arrival and travel distance were causing this family a great deal of stress.  The YNHH team partnered together and created a plan to provide hotel accommodations for this patient and her husband.  The patient / husband stayed the night before and the night of surgery and returned to their home day 2 post op.  These accommodations allowed us the ability to care for the entire patient and offer the patient a surgical intervention that she needed in a way that made her and her husband comfortable and grateful.

The Malignant Hematology patient population is a complicated group of diseases and often require a lifesaving Bone Marrow or Cellular Therapy procedure to reduce disease burden.  The BMT patient population risk of fever, infection and death is a real threat and concern for the medical team caring for these patients.  Long Inpatient hospitalizations are not always ideal or preferred as they can increase risk and delay recovery, however a early discharge to the home setting for a patient that lives greater than 25 minutes from the hospital can also cause treatment delays and serious complications including death if medical intervention is not quickly administered.  Depending on geographical disease from the hospital the patient can receive hotel accommodations through the American Cancer Society.  Without this opportunity patients would incur increased hospitalization days.