A letter from our leadership

Welcome

All of us at UC Davis Children’s Hospital are enormously proud that we’ve had another outstanding year, and we’re thankful for the tremendous work that our talented faculty members and care teams have accomplished. From pioneering historic clinical trials to developing new innovations for our littlest patients, our teams have kept going full steam ahead.

During this past year, we’ve had a shift in leadership and are honored to welcome UC Davis chief of fetal and pediatric surgery Shinjiro Hirose as our new surgeon-in-chief of UC Davis Children’s Hospital. Hirose has served as chief of pediatric surgery, vice chair of surgery and founder and director of the UC Davis Fetal Care and Treatment Center. He succeeds internationally renowned fetal and neonatal surgeon Diana Farmer, who is continuing as chair of the UC Davis Department of Surgery.

We’ve also drawn more national recognition in patient care, research and quality improvement initiatives. Recognition is important to our mission, but what we are most proud of is the culture of compassion woven through everything we do, and an awareness that children need the extraordinary care and comfort we continue to provide.

Here are some of the reasons our care resonates both nationally and locally. We were ranked in five pediatric specialties and among the Best Children’s Hospitals in America by U.S. News & World Report. Our hospital was also recognized by the National Safe Sleep Hospital Certification Program as a gold safe sleep champion, and our Comprehensive Epilepsy Program was accredited as a level 4 center — the highest designation awarded — by the National Association of Epilepsy Centers (NAEC).

In addition, our clinician-scientists have been underway developing one-of-a-kind treatments, such as the world’s first human clinical trial using stem cells to treat spina bifida before birth and a promising cellular therapy for patients with late-stage Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD).

This year, our partnerships with outlying and community hospitals have also continued to expand. We’ve partnered with the Sacramento Native American Health Center to improve access to services and pediatricians, and have kept families closer to home through telehealth services and our Regional NICU Network, which is comprised of Barton Memorial Hospital, Adventist Health Lodi Memorial Hospital, Adventist Health and Rideout, St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Stockton, Mercy San Juan and Mercy Medical Center in Redding.

For referring providers and families in our 33-county, 65,000-square-mile service area, we hope these highlights and others in this report will continue to affirm the trust you place in us.

As always, thank you for your support and partnership!