Free accommodations at hospitals for families to stay close to their children

Mums Tips

Special Kids

Published on Thursday, 06 September 2012 21:50

Last Updated on 06 March 2013

Monica Costa

1 Comment

Parents dread the idea of their children being sick. And if that happens they want to be close to them all along. I have come across a great organisation called Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC), an independent Charity which aims to provide free ‘home away from home’ accommodation at hospitals across the UK, enabling families to stay close to their child and maintain a degree of normal family life.

There are currently 15 Ronald McDonald Houses and over 25 sets of Family Rooms across the UK, all just a stone’s throw from the children’s ward. Together, they provide more than 450 rooms for families each night of the year.

Many families travel miles from home so that their child can receive expert medical care from specialist children’s hospitals across the UK. Often, children have to remain in hospital for months at a time, so for the families, staying close to their child can be a struggle.

Without a local Ronald McDonald House, many parents have to sleep on a chair by their child’s bed, on a pull down bed if this is available, or pay vast sums of money for hotel accommodation.
Ronald McDonald House Charities is determined to help as many of these families as possible by continuing to run our Houses, and by opening new Houses where there is a need.

In this ad, we meet Little Box, He is alone in a hospital, drawing on the fears and insecurities of what it must be like for a child to be in a big imposing hospital, without having Mum and Dad close by a daunting and scary thought for any small child if it was not for the help that Ronald McDonald House Charities can provide.