Ascension Sacred Heart dedicated a state-of-the art, $85 million replacement children's hospital at its Pensacola, Fla., campus on April 1. Patient care at the 126-bed Studer Family Children's Hospital is expected to begin this month.
Bishop William Wack of the Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee attends the dedication of the Studer Family Children's Hospital at Sacred Heart last month.
Speaking at the commissioning ceremony, 50 years to the day after the dedication of Sacred Heart's first children's hospital, Sr. Carol Keehan, DC, CHA's president and chief executive officer, said "Caregivers are so motivated when they have the right things and the right environment to take care of children and to take care of babies, and you have made that possible."
"I am honored to be invited back," Sr. Carol told the crowd, which included former colleagues. Sr. Carol moved to Pensacola in January 1969 to open Sacred Heart Children's Hospital as its supervisor. She headed the nursing staff and had responsibility for development and advocacy. She helped launch its neonatal intensive care unit — one of the first in the state.
"I know well how much hard work has gone into every day of this last 50 years," she told the audience. "Every child here is as important as any child in the entire world. Pensacola said that 50 years ago and you have said it again today."
Sr. Carol Keehan, CHA president and chief executive officer, talks with Dr. Robert K. Wilson Jr., a retired pediatrician and long-time advocate for the children's hospital.
The new four-story children's hospital is expected to increase access to specialized pediatric care in the region and represents Sacred Heart's single-largest investment in its 104-year history. The system committed $55 million to the project and raised another $29 million of its $30 million goal from local community members and organizations.
Sr. Carol, who was chair of the Sacred Heart Health System's board of trustees from July 2004 to January 2006, thanked Ascension Health and the donors who made the new children's hospital facility possible.
Studer Family Children's Hospital draws pediatric patients from northwest Florida, southern Alabama and southern Georgia. Critically ill newborns and children are transported to the facility aboard specially equipped ground ambulances and aircraft. The hospital has a pediatric emergency department, a 72-bed neonatal intensive care unit, a 10-bed pediatric intensive care unit, a pharmacy with specialists trained in preparing medications for infants and children, an imaging department with a CT scan in a colorfully distracting case modeled on an underwater reef, an inpatient rehabilitation gym, and a family-friendly dining venue.
The pediatric CT at the Studer Family Children's Hospital is capable of scanning a child in less than two seconds, enhancing patient safety and reducing the need to sedate young patients.
The hospital's Ronald McDonald Family Room is outfitted with a shower room, laundry room, kitchen, dining room and open living room. Three bedrooms will be available to families who need to be near children in critical condition. Sacred Heart's Pensacola campus also has a Ronald McDonald House, where families are housed while their children are hospitalized.
The new hospital "gives us the opportunity to provide an even more sophisticated, clinically advanced level of care to the children and families of this community in an environment of care and healing that's exclusively designed with the unique needs of children and families in mind," Tom VanOsdol, president and chief executive of Ascension Florida, said in a statement.
The medical staff at Studer Family Children's Hospital includes more than 120 board-certified physicians across 30 pediatric specialties. The new facility is 150,000 square feet and has 28,000 square feet of shell space for future growth. It is named for the family of Quint Studer, a Florida businessman and former chair of the Sacred Health System.