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Virginia polytrauma center gets Fisher House

The 39th Fisher House will be dedicated this Thursday at the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center in Richmond, Va.

The 16,800-square-foot house will feature 21 guest suites for families who want to be with their loved ones recuperating in the VA hospital, which is about 100 yards away.

The first families should be able to occupy rooms the following week. All guest lodging is free at Fisher Houses.

The Richmond house is the 10th Fisher House to be built at a VA medical center; the other 29 have been built near medical facilities on military installations. In some locations, like Walter Reed Army Medical Center, there is more than one house.

This is the fourth Fisher House built near a VA polytrauma unit, which are now the highest-priority locations, said Fisher House Foundation spokesman Jim Weiskopf. “It shows our commitment to making combat casualties a priority,” Weiskopf said.

The houses are now handicapped-accessible, he said. When the first house was built at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., in 1991, no one anticipated that the homes would also house combat casualties who are receiving care on an outpatient basis. And the homes are also bigger now — 21 guest rooms, compared with eight in the houses built in the earlier stages of the program.

The Fisher House Foundation builds the houses with funds donated by the public, and then turns them over to VA or the military service for operation. Designed to be a “home away from home” for families at a stressful time, the houses provide shared areas for laundry, kitchen and dining, and a cozy living room with toys for children.

After Richmond, a Fisher House at the VA center in Puget Sound, Wash., is scheduled to open Sept. 10; a second Fisher House at the San Diego Naval Medical Center, Calif., is tentatively scheduled to open Oct. 3; a house at the North Texas VA Health Care System in Dallas is scheduled to open in the fall; and a house at the Greater Los Angeles VA Medical Center is scheduled for late this year or early next year.