A ward hallway decorated with artwork by the young patients
10:45am | It’s not every day you come across a swanky catered spread laid out in a cancer ward. Of course, it’s not every day the fight against cancer features a round worth celebrating.
But the reception at Miller Children’s Hospital (MCH) last Thursday evening marked just such a turn of events, as the institution officially opened the Jonathan Jaques Children’s Cancer Center floor, thus completing the Miller Children’s pavilion, a hospital expansion begun in 2009.
The floor features 24 private rooms — each named by donors the who helped make the project possible — state-of-the-art equipment, and a large playroom featuring kid-friendly distractions ranging from toys and art supplies to computers.
“This is going to be incredible,” said Alyssa Gould, whose five-year-old son Ari has been in treatment for two-and-a-half years at MCH. “This room’s amazing; it’s so much bigger [than the previous play area]. It’s like four times the size, with all the computers…. ”
Gould also pointed out how having private rooms for patients will raise their quality of life: “It’s hard sharing rooms sometimes, [such as when] patients wake up not feeling good. […] And the whole television thing with the VCRs, and they’re just sitting there all the time, nothing they can do. It sounds silly, but that’s the reality.”
Gould, whose son is slated for one more year of treatment (“We’re having a countdown,” she says), has high praise for the MCH staff: “It’s the best staff. He’s in love with one of the nurses; he has her picture up by his bed. Dr. [Jerry] Finklestein, he’s an amazing man. They’re all great. Wonderful, so wonderful.”
It was Finklestein who administered care to Jonathan Jaques, the ward’s namesake, who in 1976, at the age of 16, inspired the creation of the Center by instructing his parents to donate his life savings of $1,000 to help future fellow pediatric cancer victims.
“Jonathan Jaques taught the world much about giving and sharing during his brief lifetime,” the hospital says on its Website. “His legacy endures as children and their families continue to receive innovative treatment, compassionate care and support at the Center that proudly bears the name of this young visionary. […] Twenty-five years later, the Jaques Family are still active supporters and have watched the Jonathan Jaques Cancer Center at Miller Children’s grow into a leading Center for pediatric oncology and hematology for the Long Beach, South Bay and surrounding communities.”
Brett Beck, director with Memorial Medical Center Foundation in charge of fundraising for MCH, explains that Proposition 3, a bond initiative for children’s hospitals that voters approved in 2008, allocated $98 million to MCH, while the $5.7 million raised during he giveHOPE fundraising campaign is part of a permanent endowment.
“That money will spin off every year — interest income — and our medical director is going to use it predominantly for pediatric cancer research,” Beck said. “We do a lot of research here. And research improves results and saves lives. So all these donors names in the end add up to saving kids’ lives. So all these donors names in the end add up to saving kids’ lives.”
But Beck points out that the services provided at MCH are not just about preserving patients’ lives, but also maximizing the quality of their lives, partly through what the hospital dubs a “psychosocial approach,” which includes having two full-time psychologists on staff — positions that are “completely philanthropically funded.”
“The only thing that insurance pays for is clinical care,” Beck said. “It pays for your bed, your medication, your operations, and that’s it. But the psychological effect cancer has on family, the child…. You go through radiation [treatment], and 10 years from now you might get another form of cancer because of the radiation. Or you might be sterile. Huge [potential] effects. There’s testing that needs to take place. You might have learning disabilities because of radiation or chemo. None of that’s paid for by insurance. But because we have philanthropic community support, we’ve [been able to] buil[d] a program here that takes the child from the day that they’re admitted and diagnosed until way into adulthood. The psychosocial approach is that whole program around the patient — and this is the family, the siblings, the effects of the chemo, the effects of the radiation, and all of that into later life that no one pays for and most families can’t afford.”
Ari (seated at left) and Alyssa Gould (standing at center) were among among parents and patients enjoying the new playroom
Miller Children’s Hospital CEO Diana Hendel addressing donors at the opening reception
Patients getting their first look at the new playroom