The University of Utah Hospital has opened a hotel for its patients and families, according to an article on the Salt Lake Tribune website. The hospital is leasing a former hotel with 44 remodeled rooms, 27 of them with small kitchenettes.

About half the rooms are filled so far with families of patients being treated at the Huntsman Cancer Institute, the university hospital or one of its clinics. Patients themselves stay there as well when they are awaiting an organ transplant, being treated for cancer, undergoing rehabilitation or still requiring outpatient care.

The families pay from $36 to $47 per night, depending on the length of the stay, and the hotel can bill insurance if it provides coverage.

The hotel has a fitness room, breakfast each morning, and a swimming pool that will be open each summer. Shuttles can carry family members to the hospital. The hotel has a pantry stocked with staples so that each guest family gets a bag of groceries to begin their stay, Wilson said.

Read the article.