Nancy Averwater remembers the day a man called her with a heart-rending question. His wife, in her 40s and the mother of their two children, had just been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. He was willing to stay home and care for her, but he had to work to pay the bills — and his wife didn't want their children to witness the ravages of her disease.

"He asked me, 'Why does this city not have a place where she can go?' recalls Averwater, administrator and CEO of Baptist Trinity Health Care and Hospice. "He wasn't being critical. He just knew there had to be a better way to care for people at the final stage of life."

Describing that conversation as a "defining moment," Averwater has been working with Baptist Memorial Health Care Corporation and community donors to establish that "better way." While BMHCC currently offers care to terminally ill patients in their homes and at the hospital's Walnut Grove location, it will soon welcome patients to the first residential facility of its kind in the area — Baptist Trinity Hospice House, set to open late summer next to BMH- Collierville. Staff will include doctors, nurses, social workers, chaplains, and grief specialists, as well as volunteers to help patients and their loved ones.

"This had been in our strategic plan for a couple of years," says Averwater. "We had looked at cities including Nashville, Chattanooga, St. Louis, even Tupelo. Each of them had a residential hospice. Then a feasibility study confirmed what we believed — that there's solid support in Memphis for such a place, and several donors stepped forward with significant gifts." A capital campaign is helping to raise $12 million — the minimum projected cost — from foundations, corporations, individuals, and employees of BMHC, who alone have donated $1.2 million. Says Averwater: "We think that's pretty remarkable in today's economy."

Before deciding on an architectural style for the hospice, Averwater did her research. "One Sunday afternoon," she recalls, "my husband drove me around the area while I took pictures of homes in Collierville that are near the development." She told the architects of JBHM she wanted Hospice House to fit into the surrounding community and they settled on the English Manor style.

Inside the facility, the environment will be homelike, featuring a spacious common living room with a stone fireplace; a large family room on each wing; a kitchen and dining areas with internet access; and an interfaith chapel open around the clock. Two wings will hold 24 bedrooms of various sizes to meet family needs. Medical equipment such as oxygen machines will be camouflaged within headboards or behind artwork. Through double French doors, the patient's bed can be wheeled out on to a patio overlooking wooded grounds. Adorning the front circular drive will be a water feature.

Adjacent to Hospice House through a breezeway will be the Kemmons Wilson Family Center for Good Grief. Although BMH Trinity's Camp Good Grief has provided care and support for children of dying patients for more than a decade, the new center will offer full-time bereavement programs for people of all ages. "We'll have a recreational area with a ropes course and climbing boulder and people certified to use this equipment in grief therapy," says Averwater. "So often, bereaved people feel hopeless and think they can't go on. They'll see that boulder and say, no way can I climb that. But they'll learn to accept help and discover they not only can go on but can become stronger."

Richard Taylor, a volunteer at BMH's Walnut Grove hospice unit, says a facility such as Hospice House would have helped his mother in her final days. She suffered from congestive heart failure and after breaking a hip, her health went downhill. Taylor appreciated the hospice care his mother received from Baptist Trinity several times a week in her home. However, he says living in a residential facility with 24-hour care would have eased her passing: "It would have given friends and family a place to visit her in a more comfortable setting, And with staff and volunteers there all the time, it would give family members someone to talk to [about their loved one]. It's definitely something this area needs."