Alameda Health System (AHS) has partnered with Cardea Health—a nonprofit organization that specializes in healthcare for vulnerable populations—to launch Eddie’s Place, a medically supported shelter for unhoused patients at the Marina Village Inn.
Eddie’s Place has served over 100 individuals since its inception in May 2023, Cardea Health CEO and co-founder Alexis Chettiar told the Post. The one-year pilot program provides care to medically frail, unhoused guests who are discharged from an emergency room at an AHS facility—including Highland, Alameda, and San Leandro hospitals—or who require continuing medical care and recuperation space following hospitalization.
Most guests have medical conditions for which continued homelessness would be detrimental to recovery. Funded by AHS and Alameda County Medi-Cal programs, the $2.8 million pilot program is intended to reduce cases of patient readmission soon after discharge.
Chettiar described the experience of one unsheltered guest who was discharged from Highland Hospital after being diagnosed with a terminal heart condition. “He wanted to live out the rest of his life in a place where he could be with his cat, which is of course not allowed in a hospital or nursing home,” Chettiar said. “He was referred to Eddie’s Place and lived out the remainder of his life there in hospice with his cat.”
Guests at Eddie’s Place are provided three meals a day and offered a variety of services, including occupational therapy and substance abuse counseling. After their stay, which can last up to a maximum of four months, guests are typically referred to nearby shelters. In some cases, guests have been released to friends or family members or have successfully located permanent housing.
Cardea Health has leased all 50 rooms at the Marina Village Inn to operate Eddie’s Place through April 30, 2024. After the conclusion of the pilot program, the owner of the Inn plans to remodel and restore the building to its original use as a hotel, Chettiar said. Cardea hopes to continue the program beyond the pilot phase, but that will depend on funding and facility availability, she added.
Prior to the Eddie’s Place program, in 2020, the Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless (ACHCH) program identified the Marina Village Inn as a Project Roomkey location to provide emergency shelter to unhoused individuals at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. The owner of the Inn was willing to lease the entire site for the effort. According to Serena Chen, Senior Policy Advisor for the Office of Alameda County Supervisor Lena Tam, the Inn also served as a quarantine and isolation facility in early 2022 for unsheltered individuals at risk of getting COVID-19.
Ken Der is a contributing writer for the Alameda Post. Contact him via [email protected]. His writing is collected at AlamedaPost.com/Ken-Der.
