Your desire to have a hen brood chicks may not be practical in your situation, but there is another alternative, and you will be integrating the chicks into your flock from the first day you have them.
The way to do it is to brood in a protected enclosure in your coop or if you have a covered run, you can brood out there. I do this when I buy chicks. I set them up under a heating pad cave in a special pen in my covered run where they grow up under the watchful gazes of my entire flock.
When the chicks are two weeks old, I open chick-size portals into the rest of the run from their pen and they begin to go out and mingle with the flock.
They are completely safe since they run back inside their pen when they need to, and the big chickens can't access their refuge. Food and water are inside the pen for them to eat in peace until they're ten weeks old.
Another advantage is they are acquiring immunity to many pathogens by being exposed to them early. This would address your concern about worrying about diseases.
If this interests you, you can read more about it by clicking on my article on outdoor brooding below.
