NCH announces new Pediatric Acute Care Center in partnership with the Chicagoland Children’s Health Alliance

Northwest Community Healthcare (NCH) today announced the launch of a new Pediatric Acute Care Center adjacent to the hospital’s emergency department. The new center includes dedicated pediatric nurses and pediatric hospitalists providing care to children 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

“The new Pediatric Acute Care Center will continue NCH’s decades-long tradition of committed, compassionate care to the children of our community,” explained Monica Joseph-Griffin, M.D., a pediatric physician with NCH who will lead the team of caregivers at the center. “We have assembled an outstanding staff of dedicated physicians, practitioners and nurses with specialty training in pediatrics to continue this tradition of quality care close to home.”

The new center is a partnership between NCH physicians and the Chicagoland Children’s Health Alliance (CCHA), a collaboration of pediatricians from NorthShore University HealthSystem, Advocate Children’s Hospital and University of Chicago Medicine Comer Children’s Hospital. The CCHA is a comprehensive network of pediatric experts, extending from primary to highly specialized care that provides personalized care coordination for children and their families. It provides access to a network of pediatricians and pediatric subspecialists across Chicagoland.

“The Pediatric Acute Care Center at NCH has been developed with the unique needs of children in mind. Children require more time, careful evaluation, closer monitoring and access to professionals who specialize in the care of children,” said Don Houchins, MSN, RN, NE-BC, Executive Director, NCH Women’s & Children’s Services. “Through our partnership with CCHA, our patients will have access to the most highly skilled pediatric specialists in the Chicagoland area. The center provides children and their families with the care and supportive environment that every family deserves.”

Pediatric-trained physicians and nurses will provide triage, ambulatory and short-stay inpatient care, as well as discharge. The majority of pediatric patients will be cared for and discharged from the center, and children requiring more complex inpatient care will be transferred to Advocate Children’s Hospital-Park Ridge, Advocate Children’s Hospital-Oak Lawn, or the University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital.

For newborns – NCH’s Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit will continue to provide the most advanced care with neonatologists providing round-the-clock care for mothers during high-risk deliveries and for newborns with special needs.

The Pediatric Acute Care Center will provide pediatric patients at NCH advanced diagnostic and imaging consultation, including all-encompassing telemedicine capabilities. Pediatric care, scans and tests will be evaluated by professionals who work with children and adolescents on a daily basis.