A home away from home for transplant patients and families
Penn’s Clyde F. Barker Penn Transplant House offers a comforting and affordable refuge for transplant patients and families—with community and hope.
2 min. read
Just steps from the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in West Philadelphia, the Clyde F. Barker Penn Transplant House offers a refuge for patients—and families of patients—taking the sometimes-unpredictable journey through organ transplant. In its communal kitchens, patients’ families trade recipes and resilience. In its quiet rooms, they rest their bodies. Since its opening in 2011, the transplant house has offered transplant patients and families a community that understands both the relentless demands of treatment and the emotional weight that comes with it.
The house bears the name of Clyde F. Barker, the Penn surgeon who performed the Penn’s first kidney transplant in 1966 and founded the Penn Transplant Institute (PTI).
His groundbreaking contributions helped shape the modern era of transplantation. Barker passed away on October 2, 2025, but the legacy he built continues to live both inside the walls of the home that carries his name, and at HUP, where PTI is one of the nation’s most active, comprehensive multi-organ transplant centers. As of 2026, when PTI is celebrating its 60th anniversary, its teams have performed nearly 7,700 kidney and 4,000 liver transplants, along with thousands of heart, lung, and pancreas transplants. Recent innovations have led to upper limb and uterus transplants, including those which have led to the birth of eight healthy babies.
Patients come here from far away because of PTI’s experience with complex, high-risk cases that many other centers are not equipped to handle. Often, however, that meant that patients and families needed to shoulder the burden of a hotel room, or find other accommodation during their treatments or recovery. To address this need, Abraham (Avi) Shaked, transplant surgeon and longtime director of PTI, championed creating a vital “home away from home” for the many families who travel to Penn Medicine in Philadelphia for care.
Celebrating its 15th anniversary in 2026, the Penn Transplant House has remained a steadfast sanctuary, offering rooms for $60 per night; a price that has remained unchanged since the day it opened. A cornerstone of the Penn Transplant House is its commitment to ensuring no family is turned away due to financial hardship. The House has long supported the cost of stays for families who otherwise could not afford it.
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