May 2007
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Meet Waltham's first infusion patients
On April 9, the new Infusion Center at Children's Hospital Boston at Waltham treated its first two patients when Jeffrey Plympton, 13, and Michael Viscomi, 24, came in for IV and blood infusions. They both agreed that Waltham's facilities were state-of-the-art. "The staff at Waltham is just as good as Boston," says Michael, a long-time Children's patient. Jeffrey agreed. "It's quieter here than in Boston, and easy to get to. And I like the high-definition TVs."
A visit to the Infusion Center is a common one for patients with chronic illnesses. Michael, for example, has thalassemia, an inherited condition in which his body cannot make enough red blood cells. So he receives a blood infusion every three weeks—for five hours at a time—to replenish his red blood cells. "It's very gradual, it doesn't even really feel like anything," says Michael. Similarly, Jeffrey needs to get Remicade IVs every eight weeks for Crohn's disease, a type of Inflammatory Bowel Disease.
These patients have discovered that Children's at Waltham is a convenient alternative for families that live in the Boston MetroWest area. "We have many of the same services that we have in Boston, and there's more of a community feel here," says staff nurse Patricia Pratt, BS, RN, CPN, Nurse Program Manager for Waltham and the Boston Infusion Clinics. "In that way it's truly a community alternative."
The Plympton family is a good example of how families can benefit from top medical care at a convenient location. "It's hard to get into Boston for all of Jeffrey's appointments, coming from Wrentham," says Jeff Plympton, Jeffrey's dad. "It makes a lot of sense for us to come to Waltham instead. It's so close to us we even have Jeffrey's primary care physician, Dr. Thomas Walker, here at Waltham too." For busy suburban families like the Plymptons, our Waltham location is bringing pediatric care a lot closer to home.
