Tiverton House provides patient, family comforts

Tiverton House provides patient, family comforts

Local guest house shelters woman as she awaits life-saving
transplant

By Gil Hopenstand

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

Becky Hammond turns and stares out the window whenever a
helicopter whisks by, wondering if it carries the lung donor for
her mother, Martha Yates. UCLA doctors will alert Yates of a donor
through a beeper clipped to her purse, after which she and Hammond
must reach the hospital within two hours.

"We watch every helicopter that goes by because the next one is
going to be for her," Hammond said in her New England accent.

Until the critical call, the duo spend most of their time in the
shadow of the Medical Center, at the Tiverton Guest House ­
UCLA’s low-cost hotel designed to accommodate medical center
patients and their families. The house is located across the street
from the center at the corner of Tiverton and Le Conte Avenues.

The guest house grew out of the need for family members of
patients to stay close to UCLA’s hospital, said Kathryn Heymann,
its general manager. Family members ­ who used to sleep in
waiting rooms, on the floor or in their cars ­ can now sleep
at Tiverton.

"The idea is that if people are ill, they do better with people
they love around them. We make it possible," she said.

Yates came with her daughter to UCLA from Maine to combat her
emphysema with a life-saving lung transplant. Hammond said that she
would have preferred to have the operation done in Massachusetts,
closer to their family and their New England home. But the hospital
there stops admitting patients after age 55, and Yates is 62.

Surrounded by plush sofas, coffee table books and fresh flowers,
Yates and Hammond described their lives during the past ten
years.

"(My mother) has asthma, she gets pneumonia a lot and bronchitis
a lot. When she first started off, she was perfectly healthy one
day and just became sick with pneumonia," Hammond said, looking
down at her restless hands.

"We just thought she’d get better. As the time progressed, she
wasn’t getting better. She was getting worse. Then she had to go on
oxygen," Hammond continued.

Emphysema is a repertory disease in which tiny air sacs in the
lungs ­ called alveoli ­ become damaged from pollutants,
especially cigarette smoke. Yates’ emphysema was brought on by
years of lung damage. Her father, a painter, kept lead-based paints
in their home which emitted toxic fumes. She was also a smoker.

Though still smiling, Yates is now confined to a wheelchair and
must be continuously supplied with oxygen. She quickly becomes
breathless, even from talking. She is also prescribed several
medications that she said do not help.

Prior to her illness she was an active woman with many friends,
Hammond described. Now she said her mother’s life has "come to a
halt."

"(Her) life is very limited," she said. "Her quality of life is
very poor. Even with simple things like bathing, she needs someone
to do that. Sometimes she needs someone to dress her and feed her.
She wouldn’t be able to go on walks. Its hard for her to get in and
out of cars at this point."

Yates’ doctors told her that without the operation, she would
have between 12 to 18 months to live.

"This is the last hope, the last thing we can do to save her,"
Hammond acknowledged.

Los Angeles is a far cry from the Yates’ hometown of Mechanic
Falls, Maine ­ a town of 2,000 residents.

"I don’t lock my doors at night," Yates said proudly. "(Until
now), I’ve never been out of my town. I’ve never even been on a
plane. I was scared because all the killings and crime (in Los
Angeles)."

Hammond, a second-grade school teacher, lives in a neighboring
Maine town. She, too, never ventured outside the area and was
admittedly apprehensive about the "big city."

However, being at Tiverton helped make her comfortable.

"I feel safe in this area," Hammond said. "If we stayed
somewhere else, I wouldn’t feel safe and we probably wouldn’t go
out. I don’t trust people. I feel so…vulnerable."

The 100-room complex, which opened just one year ago, features
an exercise room, children’s play room and coin-operated laundry.
There is daily maid service and rooms come equipped with cable
television and a small refrigerator.

Tiverton’s appeal to its guests is also financial. Room rates
average at about $65 per night, compared to $185 per night at the
Westwood Marquis hotel located just one block away. The amenities
may differ but Hammond said she is very pleased with the Tiverton
hotel and staff.

"We had other offers and people have tried to talk us into
staying at other hotels and motels in the area. We took a walk and
looked at them and always came back to this one. We felt very good
here," she said.

"We’ve made friends with a lot of other people here that are
sick," she continued. "Its good to be in a place with people that
you can relate to and talk to. They are all here for a similar
reason."

While she anxiously awaits the sound of her beeper, Yates
cherishes every piece of mail she receives from her family and
talks to them. She said she is not afraid of the long-awaited
operation and is eager to return to her life in Maine.

"I got the best doctor," she said confidently. "I’m not scared
of the process. I’d be glad to get it over with."

Doctors estimate that after the operation and the initial
hospitalization, Yates will need to remain in Los Angeles for
another two months.

Aside from her respiratory problems, Yates said that she is in
good physical health.

Regardless of their sobering mission in Los Angeles, the pair
have managed to see some of the area’s highlights.

"We went to O.J.’s house ­ we had to do that. We went to
Nicole’s condo. Those are things you have to do. We haven’t been to
the court yet," Hammond said.

They also toured downtown L.A. and Beverly Hills and saw Ronald
Reagan’s house.

"When she gets better, we’ll go to the ocean."