How We Help
No-cost housing and services for family
St. James Inn offers no-cost housing and other related services to hospital outpatients and/or family members who have loved ones undergoing critical medical care. Families are qualified and referred to St. James Inn through hospital social workers whose primary concern is recommending those who are most in need and keeping a family together in times of crisis. In its home-away-from-home environment, the Inn creates opportunities for families and outpatients to connect with others in similar situations. The Inn gives respite from the stress of critical care and provides a haven for healing for all.
Stories of Hope
Families come to St. James Inn exhausted, alone and scared. Family members are worried about their loved one. The patients are worried about their medical condition and treatment. Both groups need comforting and a safe place to heal. St. James Inn welcomes our guests with open arms and provides a safe, comfortable environment while they are going through the most difficult of circumstances. Inn guests have the opportunity to eat meals together, offer each other camaraderie and support.
Even when the patients have different diagnoses and procedures, they and their family members are able to support each other emotionally, cooking and shopping for each other, driving each other to medical appointments and in all the other ways that family members help each other.
Three years old Anna had been at UCLA waiting for a suitable transplant donor for over a year. This little patient’s family lived in Riverside and had no means of transportation. Taking a public bus to and from Riverside to UCLA on a regular basis was an impossible journey. Her mom was able to stay at the Inn after her daughter’s transplant, making it easier to bring her to post transplant monitoring as she recovered.
Candace, an Ohio scholarship college student on a semester internship in Los Angeles, had a tragic life threatening reaction to prescription medication and ended up at the UCLA emergency room with the desperate need for a liver transplant. Miraculously, a transplant soon became available. Her mom was able to fly out from Ohio and help Candace complete her final recovery. She and Anna’s mother were at St. James Inn together. The moms were able to support each other as their daughters recovered.
Jorge from Santa Paula stayed three months at SJI recovering from a double lung transplant. His wife was able to stay with him during the week and the rest of his family and granddaughter visited on Sunday afternoons.
"We cannot thank you enough for your support during that difficult time in our lives. We are happy to say our mother lived 10 years with her new liver before she left us last month. It was her wish that we donate what we could to St. James Inn."
Read the full letter here.