By Sylvie McCarthy<\/p>\n
The Foundation of Community Hospice & Palliative Care held its grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Dorion Family Pediatric Center on Thursday, June 11.<\/p>\n
Community Peds Care, a pediatric program of Community Hospice & Palliative Care, serves more than 300 children in the Jacksonville community who are living with serious and complex illnesses.<\/p>\n
These children and their families were receiving different types of therapy treatments in their homes, including music therapy, bereavement counseling, social work and sensory play.<\/p>\n
Annie Tuttle, vice president philanthropy and community impact at Community Hospice & Palliative Care, said it was important for the foundation to create a safe space for these families.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter a lot of research and talking with the families, we determined that their biggest need was a building that they could come to and receive therapy treatment,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
When families enter the Dorion Family Pediatric Center, they will be greeted with a large flex space that will serve a few different purposes. The space has a large flat screen television mounted on the wall for movie nights and a quiet area for reading.<\/p>\n
Tuttle said the flex space was designed to have a home-like feel.<\/p>\n
The new center has several different rooms including a music therapy room complete with a recording studio. Children can write and record their own songs, and it can also be used for memory-making purposes.<\/p>\n
There is also a room specifically for caregivers where they can go for bereavement support.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis room allows them a safe space to express their feelings while their child is getting therapy,\u201d Tuttle said.<\/p>\n
The new center also has a sensory playroom and a fully adaptive playground.<\/p>\n
Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan spoke at the ribbon-cutting about how proud she was to see this new center come to life.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt fills my heart to see that this community is wrapping its arms around children and their families in this way,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
With this new center, Community Peds Care will be able to help children and families for years to come.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis new center demonstrates Jacksonville\u2019s commitment to ensuring that families facing some of life\u2019s most difficult challenges have access to compassionate, high-quality care and support,\u201d said Deegan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Sylvie McCarthy The Foundation of Community Hospice & Palliative Care held its grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":311806,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":["post-315426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=315426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/311806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=315426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=315426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=315426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}