Hospital Milestones

Yesterday

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh started when the young son of a local pediatrician raised the money to endow a single cot to be used only for infants and children at a hospital. By 1890, enough funds were raised to open a 15-bed, dedicated children’s hospital in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh. By the 1920s the original hospital structure had grown into six buildings, and the hospital’s capacity had reached 100 beds.

Since that time, Children’s has been committed to its three-part mission of providing the highest quality patient care, biomedical research and medical education. Its contributions have been recognized globally. The hospital’s milestones include the development and introduction of the polio vaccine by Dr. Jonas Salk in the 1950s; the development of the Mr. Yuk poison prevention campaign in 1971, which has since saved countless lives; and the development of the Hillman Center for Pediatric Transplantation, the world’s largest and most advanced pediatric transplantation center.

Today

Renowned for its outstanding clinical services, Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC has helped establish the standards of excellence in pediatric care. From Ambulatory Care to Transplantation and Cardiac Care, talented and committed pediatric experts care for infants, children and adolescents who make more than 400,000 visits to Children’s and its ambulatory care centers each year.

Children’s Hospital also has been named consistently to several elite lists of pediatric health care facilities, including ranking seventh among children’s hospitals (FY 2005) in funding provided by the National Institutes of Health, and among the top pediatric hospitals in the country by Child magazine.

Children’s is the only hospital is western Pennsylvania dedicated solely to the care of infants, children and young adults. Care is provided by more than 700 board-certified pediatricians and pediatric specialists. Children’s also provides primary care and specialty care at accessible locations throughout the Pittsburgh region, as well as clinical specialty services throughout western Pennsylvania at regional health care facilities.

With 260 beds, Children’s delivers among the most technologically advanced procedures for rare, complex diseases as well as progressive treatments for common childhood ailments, such as ear infections and asthma. Children’s health care professionals understand that sick and injured children deserved to be treated by those specially trained to care for them – rather than by adult specialists with limited pediatric experience. Click here to view Children’s capabilities brochure, New Frontiers for Children.

And, at no time is any child turned away.

Tomorrow

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh continues to expand upon our already world-renowned clinical care and research efforts to provide the best care to all children. A new, state-of-the-art, comprehensive pediatric health care campus is currently being built in the Lawrenceville section of Pittsburgh. Pediatric research will be conducted in the new 300,000-square-foot research center – which is more than twice the size of the current research center. From pediatric trauma care to transplantation, Children’s is pioneering the techniques and therapies that will save the lives of future generations of children.

Every inpatient room will be private, providing additional space for parents to stay while their child is in the hospital. Click here for more details on the new campus.

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC Highlights

• Children’s pediatric experts care for infants, children and adolescents who make more than 400,000 visits to Children’s and its many neighborhood locations each year.
• More than $27 million was provided in free care in fiscal year 2006.
• Children’s has been one of the only pediatric transplant centers in the world to pioneer the use of a ventricular assist device as a bridge to heart transplantation.
  • Children’s performed the world’s first pediatric heart-lung transplant.
  • Children’s performed the world’s first pediatric heart-liver transplant.
• CHILD magazine routinely ranks Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh among the best pediatric hospitals in the country.
• Children’s National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding increased from $7 million to $14.3 million in fiscal year 2004, and that dollar amount is expected to increase again this year.
• In 2005, Children’s ranked seventh in overall funding provided by the NIH to children's hospitals.
• Children’s is one of only three Pediatric Regional Resource Trauma Centers in the state accredited by the Pennsylvania Trauma Systems Foundation.
• Children’s emergency medicine service and trauma program sees about 59,000 children each year.
• Children’s was one of the first pediatric hospitals in the nation where physicians use an information management system for virtually all inpatient care orders – from blood tests to medications to treatments. Called Computerized Provider Order Entry, the system eliminates handwritten and verbal orders and the problems that can accompany them, such as illegible writing, transcription errors, unsigned orders and delays in communicating orders.
• Health care professionals at Children’s practice family-centered care in all aspects of treatment, inpatient stays and visits. Children’s cares for the entire family.
• Has two, state-of-the-art, minimally invasive surgical suites, allowing patients to recover faster, go home sooner, and experience less scarring, both internally and externally.
• Provides a Medical-Free Zone on each floor; in these activity centers, discussions about a patient's health are prohibited.