GIVING COMFORT IN THE FACE OF DEATH.

Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY 

``It doesn't matter whether you're a millionaire or a poor man, everyone should be treated with dignity at the end.''Joanie Baczkowski, nursing supervisor at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center in Sylmar.

The man from Kentucky looked around the new comfort room at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center a few weeks ago - at the new TV and VCR, the microwave and refrigerator, the fold-out couch and comfortable chairs - and just shook his head.

``My brother never stayed in a place this nice before, never,'' Brian Howard said to Joanie Baczkowski.

The nursing supervisor at the Sylmar county hospital didn't miss the sad irony of what he was saying. What a shame, she thought.

His brother - a 53-year-old transient dying from alcoholism - had to be on death's door to finally stay in a nice room.

``Why don't you tell him?'' she said. ``He may be unconscious, but I'm sure he can hear you. Talk to him.''

So that's what the man from Kentucky did. He pulled a chair up real close to his brother's bed, took his hand, and with tears in his eyes, described in detail what a beautiful room he was staying in.

Then, Howard unpacked his bags and moved in himself. Two days later, his brother died, and the man from Kentucky left for home.

But not before thanking everyone at this busy, crowded county hospital where mainly the poor come to die.

``Staying in that beautiful room gave me a chance to reflect on my memories of him, make my peace with him, and say goodbye to him,'' Howard said from Kentucky by phone Wednesday.

``They treated my brother like he was someone special at the end.''

Like he was a millionaire or something, not a poor man.

< Beverly Froelich listened carefully to Dr. Irwin Zimment talk about what the other doctors and nurses were seeing every day in Olive View's hallways and rooms.

Mothers and fathers, kids and grandparents camping out in the rooms of dying loved ones, sleeping on floors, and roaming the hallways at 2 a.m. looking for some food because they didn't eat all day.

They were trying their best to stay out of the way and not cause the medical staff a problem, but they also did not want to leave.

When the end came for that loved one in the hospital bed, they wanted the family to be there to say goodbye in person, not get a phone call.

It is a gut-wrenching, national issue - the focus of a Time magazine cover story this week and a weeklong special Bill Moyer's public television series.

What Olive View needed, said Zimment, the hospital's chief of medicine, was a special, private room where family members could stay with a loved one during the last few days or week of life.

But he knew the harsh realities of such an idea. This was a county hospital. Money was short, and space at a premium.

There was nothing in the budget for a comfort room. That was something for those uptown hospitals with patients who had money and insurance.

Most of the patients at Olive View had neither.

Froelich, executive director of the Olive View-UCLA Medical Center Foundation, the fund-raising/community outreach arm of the hospital, understood exactly what Zimment was saying.

Help us help them.

And that's what the foundation did. More than $20,000 was raised from the Wings Annual Fund, a fund-raiser where families in the community and hospital personnel donate money to have a plaque with their family names on it dedicated at the hospital.

``We used the money to redo and modernize the bathroom, bought new furniture, appliances, new wallpaper, artwork and everything we could think of to make this room as homey and comfortable as we could for a family to stay with a loved one in the waning days of life,'' Froelich said Wednesday.

Officially, the room opens today, just down the hall from the intensive care unit.

Unofficially, it opened a few weeks ago for the man from Kentucky and his brother.

The staff at this county hospital felt it just wasn't right for a man to come all that way to say goodbye to his brother, and not have a peaceful, comfortable place to stay with him until the end.

Because it really doesn't matter whether you're a millionaire or a poor man. Everyone should be treated with dignity at the end.

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Photo:

Nursing Supervisor Joanie Baczkowski, Dr. Irwin Zimment and fund-raising foundation director Beverly Froelich stand in the comfort room at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center.

Tom Mendoza/Staff Photographer