Cancer patients" families face dire housing shortage Chris and Anna Reilly with sons William, who is undergoing cancer treatment, and Luke. Picture: David Caird Source: News Limited A DRASTIC accommodation shortage has left cancer patients struggling to find a place to stay in Melbourne while they undergo lifesaving treatment. A leading charity that helps leukaemia and blood cancer patients from rural and regional Victoria and interstate said they could not keep up with demand. At any one time there are 30 patients on their waiting list and some even need to be put up in hotels while they wait. The Leukaemia Foundation provides families with free accommodation during this stressful time in their lives. Last year it provided patients with 980 nights of motel accommodation ranging from one night to many months. To address the accommodation shortage it is embarking on a bold bid to build a new Victorian Accommodation Centre for patients undergoing chemotherapy and bone-marrow transplants. It has purchased 15 new apartments in Parkville, but the charity desperately needs Victorians to chip in to help meet the cost of the $9 million project. In one year alone there were almost 400 patients who had bone-marrow transplants in Melbourne, including up to 50 children. The Leukaemia Foundation's general manager for Victoria and Tasmania, Stephanie Hechenberger, said these patients often faced stays of between four and 24 months in Melbourne. Their immune system is severely compromised while they recover so they require hygienic accommodation close to the hospital. The Reilly family were fortunate enough to secure a place in one of its apartments in North Melbourne for six months while their son William, 3, had a bone-marrow transplant. His parents, Anna and Chris, said commuting back and forth to their home in Pirron Yallock, 2.5 hours" drive from Melbourne, would have just been impossible. If we hadn't got the apartment ... we wouldn't have been able to stay together as a family - it was a welcome relief. Professor David Ritchie, director of the Bone Marrow Transplant Service at The Royal Melbourne Hospital, said they care for patients from Victoria, Tasmania and southern NSW. "Often protracted periods of outpatient monitoring is required preventing patients from returning to their homes immediately even though they may have been discharged from inpatient care," he said. Similarly, for the families of patients requiring inpatient care, having somewhere to stay locally significantly eases their burden and provides much needed family support for patients admitted to hospital. Originally published as Cancer patients" families face housing shortage