St. Luke’s Boise offers $45-a-night rooms in former B&B for out-of-town patients

Commuting to St. Luke’s Boise Medical Center will now be much easier — and affordable — for some patients.

The hospital is offering seven rooms at its St. Luke’s Heritage House, on the St. Luke’s campus at 109 W. Idaho St., for patients and their families who would otherwise undertake long commutes for treatment.

Last year, the hospital bought the property, formerly the Idaho Heritage Inn bed and breakfast. Each room has a bathroom, and the seven rooms share a kitchen, laundry machines and common spaces for patients to meet with caregivers.

Gabrielle Moore, St. Luke’s patient housing manager, said Heritage House will provide an affordable alternative to hotels for patients staying in Boise for days or weeks. The rooms cost between $40 and $45 per night.

“Traveling to Boise for medical care can be an overwhelming, fearful experience, especially for those coming from rural communities,” Moore said in a news release from St. Luke’s. “Offering them an affordable place to stay right on the hospital campus can be a huge emotional and financial relief.”

Since opening last week, most of the house’s tenants have been patients receiving radiation or chemotherapy treatments. The first patient to stay there, Elizabeth Campbell, had previously commuted two hours each way from her home in Fairfield, a 106-mile drive east of Boise, for chemotherapy.

“[Treatments are] Monday through Friday,” Campbell told St. Luke’s. “They are shorter treatments, but every day. It just doesn’t make sense to drive back and forth every single day.”

This story was originally published February 23, 2017 at 10:32 AM with the headline "St. Luke’s Boise offers $45-a-night rooms in former B&B for out-of-town patients."