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St. Alphonsus expansion offers improvements for chemotherapy patients

Posted at 7:30 PM, Sep 15, 2019
and last updated 2019-09-15 22:15:50-04

BOISE, Idaho — Cancer patients in the Treasure Valley could soon see some improvements in their chemotherapy treatments.

A new expansion of the St. Alphonsus Cancer Care Center will help make the process of undergoing treatment a little easier and more relaxing.

Benefiting from money raised at last year's Festival of Trees, the hospital's Infusion Program is now using virtual reality and art therapy to ease anxiety and pain for chemotherapy patients.

"Having a cancer diagnosis is really hard," St. Alphonsus Medical Director Andrew Scott Pierson said. "They can spend hours needing infusions, so the space they get that needs to be very comforting and calm and peaceful. So I think we are achieving that with this new space that we have."

The expansion also increases capacity in the infusion clinic by 50%, which means St. Alphonsus can serve a thousand more patients each year.