Childrens Hospital And Health System Inc

Programs: Chhs is the parent organization of an integrated system of entities providing comprehensive medical care and social services to children from wisconsin and throughout the country. The system includes wisconsin's only freestanding hospital dedicated solely to the care and treatment of children, as well as various other facilities providing inpatient and outpatient care for children with all types of illnesses, injuries, birth defects and other disorders. The system also includes extensive research, education and community outreach programs. On an aggregate basis, the entities within the system provided community benefits of over $108 million. Chhs oversees and coordinates the activities of the various operating entities within the integrated system, through the provision of supportive and administrative services on a consolidated, centralized basis.

children's research institute ("cri") is a program of chhs that advances pediatric medical research in wisconsin and beyond. With a focus on translational research, cri is taking discoveries from the laboratory and converting them to new therapies at patients' bedsides. Children's provides institutional support of research through infrastructure support such as laboratory space, shared equipment, and shared services (including biostatisticians, grant writers, and clinical research nurses). Several researchers have demonstrated their research success through the extramural funding they have received, a few examples are below. Researchers at cri are investigating ways to improve care for heart transplant patients, including the development of a new method to monitor pediatric heart transplant recipients and identify early signs of transplant rejection. Cri researchers continue to make progress on the $3. 3 million, five-year grant received in 2013 from the national institute of health's national heart, lung and blood institute to complete a six-center clinical study of the noninvasive approach. Typically, heart transplant patients must undergo a series of eight to twelve biopsies per year to monitor for transplant rejection. This invasive approach poses certain risks, and can be difficult for children who have already spent a considerable amount of time hospitalized. The researchers have designed a noninvasive approach that involves a simple blood draw. The level of donor dna in the blood serves as a barometer of heart health; more than one-percent of donor dna in the blood indicates rejection. In a pilot study, this method showed 100% sensitivity. Cri focuses efforts on childhood cancer research, including improving survivorship and quality of life for children battling some of the toughest forms of the disease. In 2013, children's hospital of wisconsin ("chw") was awarded a 10-year $10 million gift from the macc fund (midwest athletes against childhood cancer). This gift continues to be used to further cancer research in three areas: discovery and testing of new drug therapies, increased use of cellular therapies and further genetic research for personalized cancer therapies. In addition, our researchers are active with the therapeutic advances in childhood leukemia & lymphoma (tacl) consortium. This national consortium was established to develop and conduct phase i /ii clinical trials of new drugs and novel drug combinations for recurrent childhood leukemia or lymphoma. Our researchers also continue to participate in the cog (children's oncology group) consortium for clinical trials of novel pediatric cancer therapies. In the area of genetics and rare disease research, cri investigators continue to make progress on the $1 million grant received from the w. M. Keck foundation to support genetic research and testing. A team of researchers and physicians from chw and the medical college of wisconsin are developing test systems using gene editing to generate and functionally test genetic variants of interest. The goal of the project is to understand more about genetic variants of uncertain significance, in order to end the diagnostic odyssey for these patients. A researcher in our nursing research department received a $400,000 grant from johnson & johnson to further her work in premature infants. Over a period of decades this researcher's team has worked to develop and refine interventions that support the infant's in-hospital experience with the goal of improving growth and development. This is important because optimal infant experience is known to critically shape a child's cognitive development, ability to self-regulate, and stress reactivity. There is increasing evidence that neurobiological systems are influenced by regulatory neuropeptides, including the hormone oxytocin, which are critical components of early development. The purpose of this grant is to compare neuropeptide levels of healthy newly born full term infants before and following two maternally administered multisensory behavioral interventions. This study also aims to quantify maternal psychological well-being and infant behavioral responses to the maternally administered multisensory behavioral interventions. Additionally, it is hypothesized that mothers will report improved psychological well-being and infants will exhibit an increased frequency of engagement cues following the maternally administered intervention. Funding has also been secured for a community-based research project - a $1. 25 million grant from the greater milwaukee foundation to study asthma triggers. A child's asthma is managed in a clinical setting, but one of the biggest impacts on the disease is indoor air quality, which can't be assessed in a doctor's office. Indoor air quality is affected by gas ranges, cleaning products, dust, and mold-factors that disproportionately impact poor, urban families. In collaboration with a non-profit asthma coalition, this researcher is leading the first study to determine which chemicals, particulates, and pesticides can be commonly found in the homes of asthmatic kids and young adults in milwaukee. At the same time, the research team will look at whether an in-home educational curriculum gives families the knowledge to reduce these irritants and help control asthma and reduce hospitalizations. The study uses new technologies to measures air pollutants in kids' home-from silicone bands that absorb pesticides and other compounds to air-quality devices that continuously measure humidity and particulates. Community health workers visit homes to conduct inspections and provide several education sessions on asthma and irritant reduction. They also recommend tactics for reducing irritants and provide supplies such as hepa vacuum cleaners and "green" cleaners. Four to six months later, the community health workers will return to see whether families sustained the changes and how well kids' asthma was controlled following the intervention.

chhs provides various outpatient health care services. In 2016, there were 29,314 visits to the organization's urgent care clinics, and 4,177 outpatient surgical cases performed at the organization's ambulatory surgical center, the surgicenter of greater milwaukee, llc (a disregarded entity for federal tax purposes).

chhs offers free and inexpensive health education programs and resources to teachers, children and parents. Programs offered include in-classroom programs on healthy eating and exercise, bullying and teen depression. In addition, chhs has injury prevention programs which focus on car seat and bike helmet fittings, to keep children safe and healthy. Chhs also offers health-based e-learning programs through bluekids. Org which helps students make more positive health choices. Chhs also provides full time school nurses in 10 partner milwaukee public schools and part time nursing services in an additional two mps schools at no cost to the students, families or schools. The nurses provide chronic disease management, acute care for minor illness and injuries, health maintenance and promotion, preventive care, risk reduction, screenings including referrals and follow up, trauma informed care, and care coordination in an area with high-risk populations and limited services. In 2016, there were 19,532 school nurse encounters with a 94% return to class rate. Vision screenings were completed on 589 students and over 600 referrals were made for additional care needs discovered during a school nurse office visit. The school nurses also provide classroom education to students and faculty on a variety of health related topics according to the needs of the school, and work closely with the community health navigators and community connectors on population-based care, outreach, and addressing the social determinants of health. Since 2014 chhs partnered with wisconsin's department of health services and the department of children and families and established a foster care medical home program called care4kids to administer the coordination of comprehensive health care services inclusive of medical, dental and behavioral health care services for children placed in "out of home care" (a. K. A. "foster care") in kenosha, milwaukee, ozaukee, racine, washington, and waukesha counties in wisconsin. Upon enrollment into the program these foster care children have access to children's community health plan's ("cchp") provider network as cchp provides administrative and utilization services for care4kids programming. Through december of 2016, program enrollment was 2,978 which represented approximately 42% of the total out of home care population in the state of wisconsin.