Nearly 20 years ago, when Susan Plank's daughter Kendall was 12, a cousin called and said she had a young friend going through his second bone marrow transplant at a hospital near the Planks' home in Houston. Could they do anything to help cheer him up?
The Planks thought about it, found out more about the boy, named J.B., and learned he loved all things Texas Longhorns, the mascot of the University of Texas at Austin. The mother-daughter duo shopped for items to make a welcoming hospital room accented with the team's burnt orange color for the boy.
The Planks saw J.B.'s elation when he returned to his room from a blood draw. "He was going, 'Oh my God, this is fantastic. Oh, wow, wow!'" recalled Susan Plank. "What it did to him was unbelievable."
The mother and daughter looked at one another and decided: They wanted to do this not just for J.B., but for every child who had an extended stay in a hospital.
That was the start of Dec My Room, a Houston-based nonprofit the Planks founded that has funded personalized decor for more than 10,000 hospital rooms at 218 hospitals nationwide. While the organization focuses on children, it also decorates the rooms of young adults and of expectant mothers hospitalized for extended stays.
Susan Plank is the organization's CEO and Kendall Plank is its president. They work with a national director and a coordinator of special events to raise money through grants and fundraisers and to build up its volunteer base.
Kelsey Mitchell is the manager of child life at Mercy Children's Hospital St. Louis, one of the hospitals the organization serves. She said the decorated rooms create a relaxed mood that can help children, families and caregivers alike.
"For a doctor who has never met this kid before to walk in and say, 'Oh, do you like Hello Kitty? I loved Hello Kitty when I was a kid,' or 'My daughter loves Hello Kitty,' that's an instant win and an instant positive for the patient and the family and the provider," Mitchell said.
How it works
Sometimes caregivers decorate hospital hallways or walls or families hang cards or bring personal items to decorate a room. But organizations like Dec My Room level things up.
A similar organization, Los Angeles-based Once Upon A Room, serves more than 40 hospitals in 16 states, and has transformed rooms at Our Lady of the Lake Children's Hospital, part of FMOL Health, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
As for Dec My Room, typically a hospital caregiver contacts the organization if they know a patient's stay will last more than three weeks. Patients and families fill out a form with patients' likes and preferences, such as superheroes, a particular sports team, cartoon characters, or colors.
The decorating is done by volunteers who are trained by Dec My Room. Often, volunteers work in pairs and recruit friends for the organization, Susan Plank said. The volunteers get information about the patient but because of privacy laws only learn their first names and nothing about their health condition.
Dec My Room provides a $300 budget for room decor. The volunteers, identifiable by their customized blue aprons, get two or three days to shop and decorate.
"We just go in and try to brighten their room and do as much as we can, and it probably takes about 30 to 40 minutes," Plank said.
The decorations must be removable and easily washable. Paper decorations must be laminated. When the patient goes home, they get to take everything with them.
There are variations of the program: Dec My Room sometimes provides funds for child life specialists and caregivers to do the shopping and decorating, or volunteers under 18 might raise money and shop but leave the decorating to adults.
Normalizing a stay
Mitchell, of Mercy Children's, says Dec My Room has provided decorations for three children's and several expectant mothers' rooms. The hospital contacts Dec My Room with information about the patient, and the nonprofit shops for and ships the decorations to the hospital. Caregivers then decorate the rooms.
Mitchell recalled a 6-year-old boy who was burned in a house fire and lived far from the hospital. His brother was treated for burns as well but was released before him. The boy's superhero-themed room decorations from Dec My Room helped the family, which also included a sister.
"When they came to the hospital, it didn't feel as scary for them, either," Mitchell said. "It didn't feel like an ICU room with beeps and cords and machines."
She said the child life team at Mercy Children's lives by the motto: "It takes more than medicine to heal a child." They know that they have to include the family, to make time for play, and even to pray for the families.
"We're not just taking care of people's medical needs, but we're taking care of the emotional needs, the psychosocial needs," she said. "And Dec My Room fits right into that. We don't have to go the extra mile to make a kiddo's room even more special for them, but we know that's important."
Boosting spirits
Studies have shown that family-friendly hospital design can help reduce anxiety for children and stress for parents. Outdoor spaces, nature-inspired environments, and colorful decor can contribute to overall healing, and interesting decor can provide a mental distraction.
Lauren Bergmann is a child life specialist at Covenant Children's hospital in Lubbock, Texas. The hospital has partnered with Dec My Room to transform about 20 rooms within the past year. Covenant Children's is part of Providence St. Joseph Health.
A hospital where Bergmann had interned in South Carolina participated in the program, and she reconnected with the group after seeing their table at a child life conference.
She consults a list that shows how many days patients have been at Covenant Children's. Once they hit the 14-day mark, she might message the child life specialist assigned to the patient to see how long the child is expected to stay and if a family is interested in participating. If so, Dec My Room does its thing.
Bergmann sees how sad and upset young patients can get. Sometimes patients reach a point where they refuse medications or to get up for treatment because they're bored, worried and tired of looking at blank walls.
"With Dec My Room, they can come in and make it seem like a whole different place," she said. "And so it really boosts the kids' spirits, just for med compliance and for ease of staying, and for less aggressive behaviors. It was a really important thing for me to get started."
She recalled a 2-year-old boy who didn't talk a lot, but when he did, it was about farm animals. Dec My Room festooned his room with barnyard cutouts on the door, a barnyard-themed bedspread, and a banner with a spotted cow print. The decor helped bring the child out of his shell, and he became more willing to talk with and interact with staff.
Going the extra mile with programs like Dec My Room helps fulfill the mission of the hospital, Bergmann said.
"I think it shows the servant heart behind it, and how we really want to see them thrive and support them and help them through every situation," she said.
