March 10, 2020

On March 5, a ceremony was held to celebrate Texas Children’s newest wall dedicated to honoring those who contribute financial support to the organization.

The Promise Campaign donor wall, is named after the fundraising effort established in 2015 to help ensure that we can continue fulfilling our commitment and promise to meet the medical needs of children in our community, with a goal of raising $475 million by 2020.

On the first floor of the Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower, Texas Children’s executives, board members, and donors, arrived to music and refreshments just before to ceremony began. President and CEO Mark A. Wallace began with a welcome, briefly taking the audience on a virtual walk through the years leading up to how we have kept our promise to patients and ultimately preserved our legacy.

“Thank you for your unwavering dedication to this hospital, and for embracing the change it takes to grow and create a successful organization,” Wallace said. “We are here today to celebrate history – to celebrate the story of Texas Children’s Hospital – and to unveil the beautiful Promise Campaign donor wall.”

He followed up with an introduction of chairman of the Promise Campaign and the Texas Children’s board or directors, Mike Linn. Under Linn and his wife’s leadership, the Promise campaign has raised millions of dollars for Texas Children’s and its growing need to provide dedicated, specialized pediatric health care in Houston and surrounding communities.

“The Promise Campaign is an endeavor that will always be near and dear to my heart,” Linn expressed. “I want to thank every person here – you helped bring us to this day. You believed in our dream and generously invested in it so that it could become a reality.

The Promise Campaign made its goal and raised more than $500 million two years early. This success allowed the Promise Campaign donor wall to exist today displaying 390 donor names.

After the ceremony wrapped up with closing remarks from Wallace, donors anxiously gathered to take photos near their name on the wall.

Click here for more information about the Promise Campaign.

October 29, 2019

Texas Children’s Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower recently won the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) Design Award sponsored by the American Association of Critical Care Nurses, the Society of Critical Care Medicine and the American Institute of Architects Academy on Architecture for Health.

Each year, a panel of judges including physicians, nurses and architects from the sponsoring organizations evaluate adult, pediatric and neonatal ICUs around the world. The award is based on several criteria including functional design, integration of technology, and use of innovative, aesthetic and creative design elements that promote an efficient, safe and healing environment for the delivery of critical care.

“We are grateful to receive the ICU Design award,” said Dr. Lara Shekerdemian, Chief of Critical Care at Texas Children’s. “This award is a culmination of four years of hard work, collaboration, creative thinking and meticulous attention to detail that went into the design of our ICU spaces. The award is for everyone at Texas Children’s who, together with our partners at FKP Cannon Design, Bellows, and our amazing family advisory committee, helped us plan, design and seamlessly transition to our wonderful new home – Legacy Tower.”

To create a safe, efficient, and family-centered environment, Texas Children’s involved patients, families and all disciplines of the health care team from day one of the project through its completion in September 2018. From reviewing workflows to participating in patient care simulations before, during and after construction, design requirements were continuously refined to ensure the final layout would meet patient and staff needs.

As part of the ICU Design Award application process, Texas Children’s created a video highlighting our award-winning Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) and the distinct features that help distinguish our hospital from other pediatric institutions.

The Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower has 138 ICU rooms, all with dedicated family space, over seven floors. The new ICU floors include a dedicated subspecialty neuro-ICU, surgical ICU, heart failure ICU and a neonatal cardiac ICU.

Since opening the Legacy Tower PICU in May 2018 and the Legacy Tower Cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit (CICU) in September 2018, patients, families, and our critical care team have benefited from the design features that helped the organization achieve this award.

Patient families
  • The overall size of the patient rooms is more than double that of the older ICU rooms, allowing more space for visitors and patient families to remain together comfortably. Each patient room has a spacious private bathroom, complete with a shower for patient and family convenience.
  • Patient rooms have large windows that provide more natural sunlight and beautiful views for patients and their families who aren’t able, or rarely leave the hospital.
  • Large family lounges sponsored by Ronald McDonald House are on each patient floor to provide space for family members to wait, read, eat, and engage in activities outside a patient’s environment. Family laundry spaces on each floor also offer a much-needed convenience for families.
  • Sun-filled respite areas are located throughout the PICU floors to provide families peaceful time to themselves.
PICU Team
  • The configuration of the ICU spaces provides care teams with enhanced visibility and monitoring between patient rooms and into the patient rooms from the nurses’ workstations.
  • Remote monitoring and carefully designed communication panels enable clinicians to respond quickly to emergencies throughout the ICU areas.
  • Patient’s pumps, monitors and ventilators are attached to booms mounted to the ceiling of the room. This allows the patient to be positioned anywhere in the 360-degree circle, and allows medical staff to use high-tech equipment at the bedside while keeping the equipment off the floor.
  • Each ICU bed has an LED examination light that enables the teams to carry out intricate surgical procedures at the bedside on the most unstable patients.
  • A badge-accessible medication “pass-through”, similar to what you see at a pharmacy drive-through, allows pharmacy technicians to drop off medication to patients without having to enter the patient room, providing more privacy for patients and their family.
  • A touch screen safety monitor in each room allows clinicians to call for assistance from the nurse’s station. The technology allows for more efficient communication.

“Our patients and their families are very happy with their new spaces, and we are very excited to be in our new home for critical care in Legacy Tower,” said Gail Parazynski, Vice President of Nursing. “It took several years of planning to get to where we are today. It was a team effort on many different levels to ensure a safe environment of care was cultivated for our critical care staff, patients and their families.”

Texas Children’s will formally receive the ICU Design Award when the Society of Critical Care Medicine convenes for their annual meeting in February 2020.

September 23, 2019

Just a few months after being named the No. 1 destination in the country for pediatric cardiology and cardiac surgery for the third straight year, Texas Children’s Heart Center® is celebrating another milestone.

One year ago, on September 25, the Heart Center made the historic move into its new home in Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower.

Watch the video of move day.

The entire day was a carefully orchestrated ballet of coordination.

“The move to the Heart Center was the culmination of two years of preparation and was a momentous day for us all,” said Chief of Critical Care Dr. Lara Shekerdemian. “There were lots of moving parts all working together in concert, which was incredible. The entire day was a testament to collaboration and great planning.”

Six specially trained teams made up of more than 200 members transported 64 heart patients, some critically ill, safely to their new, state-of-the-art rooms. The patients ranged in age from 3 days to 22 years. As units in the new tower prepared for patients’ arrival, team members in a command center were monitoring patients’ conditions, making sure facilities were ready, and stationing support teams along the travel routes in case of emergency.

“Fortunately, we had experience since we had moved the pediatric and the transitional intensive care units over to the new building in the months prior to the Heart Center move,” said Maria Happe, Texas Children’s nurse practitioner and clinical project manager for Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower. “There was a lot of excitement and tons of activity in each unit as we were getting patients, parents and teams ready to move.”

Settling in

The new Heart Center was designed from top to bottom with families in mind. One of the most important difference-makers that Heart Center staff and employees are quick to point out is the ability for families to stay together while a child receives care.

“Being able to have parents in the rooms with their children, for them to be able to comfortably stay in the space, has been a huge improvement, said Carmen Watrin, director of nursing for inpatient units. “It’s also made families essentially a part of the care team, which has been phenomenal. The families are so grateful.”

The new space also increased desperately needed care capacity. During one especially difficult period in 2013, spatial constraints rendered Texas Children’s incapable of accepting additional transports of critically ill children. We were simply too full. This prompted the historical expansion of critical, surgical and emergency care capacity that included the construction of Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower.

“We never want to be in a position where we say no to a family or to a child,” said Chief of Cardiovascular Anesthesiology Dr. Emad Mossad. “This new setting has given us the privilege, and the space and resources, to be able to serve as many patients as come our way. It’s been a great thing to move to a new space, a new place, a fresh start, and to have the capacity to be able to say yes to families who are seeking our help.”

In addition to new space, the Heart Center has been on a mission to ensure that it has the staff needed to deliver the highest possible level of care. One example has been the onboarding of over one hundred new nurses to ensure that nurse-to-patient ratios are always at the optimum level. There’s also no substitution for experience, especially in health care, which is why in the months leading up to the Heart Center move, cardiac intensive care unit (CICU) leadership worked not only to recruit the best nurses, but also to retain them. As a result, the number of CICU nurses with greater than two years’ experience has increased over the past year, which helps improve the overall quality of the team.

Eyes on the future

With a year now in the books, the No. 1 heart center in the country is focused on continuing to deliver the best care, but also to improving wherever possible and to growing as a team.

“I’m looking forward to further consolidating the concept of a heart center as something that we all are part of,” said Chief of Congenital Heart Surgery Dr. Christopher Caldarone. “We all have allegiances to many things – to our community, to our families, to our homes, to the hospital, to our academic department. Over the next year, we want to continue creating a culture here in the Heart Center where people feel like they are truly a part of this big team.”

Additionally, the Heart Center is looking forward to growing care capabilities, including an expansion of the Adult Congenital Heart Disease (ACHD) program. Over the course of the next year, the Heart Center will develop a dedicated center for adults with congenital heart disease, where they will be treated by specialists who recognize and understand their unique needs.

“This expansion will be a huge statement by Texas Children’s Hospital,” said Chief of Pediatric Cardiology Dr. Daniel Penny. “There should never be an expiry date on the care of children with congenital heart disease as they transition to adulthood. Our ACHD team already provides amazing care, but with this expansion, all aspects of care for adults with congenital heart disease will be available on one dedicated unit. It’s an exciting time at Texas Children’s Heart Center.”

Learn more about the world-class care and services provided at Texas Children’s Heart Center.

June 11, 2019

Texas Children’s entered FY19 with a renewed focus on improving operational effectiveness and maintaining our financial excellence, goals that allow us to continue developing, expanding and reinvesting in our mission to provide the very best care for our patients and families.

Our recent credit ratings from the nation’s top three credit agencies are proof we’re accomplishing those goals.

The agencies – Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s and Fitch – have once again affirmed Texas Children’s high credit ratings (Aa2, AA and AA respectively), as well as a stable financial outlook. It is the 23rd straight year Texas Children’s has maintained outstanding credit ratings.

“This is fantastic news and it speaks volumes about Texas Children’s,” said President and CEO Mark Wallace. “The agencies’ ratings are certainly a reflection of our consistently strong financial performance, but their analysis goes beyond just the numbers. They also noted our world-class medical staff, our seasoned management team, and our successful expansion efforts, including the completion of the Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower and our growth in Austin. We should all be very proud of this achievement.”

Each year, the agencies analyze financial, operational and strategic data to determine our ratings, which can be compared to a company’s stock price or a person’s credit score. A great rating for Texas Children’s means that we are a financially sturdy organization that can easily meet our financial commitments, which leads to job security for each and every employee.

All three agencies cited Texas Children’s track record of clinical excellence, robust research programs, exceptional reputation, outstanding fundraising capabilities and strong financial position as key reasons for the ratings.

June 3, 2019

On May 31, nearly 100 guests – including Texas Children’s executive and physician leadership, members of the Board of Trustees, and the family of Lester and Sue Smith – gathered in the Russell and Glenda Gordy lobby for the official dedication and blessing of Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower.

Among late Houston philanthropist Lester Smith’s greatest joys was his dedication to the service of others. Most recently, Lester and his wife, Sue, announced a $50 million gift and helped raise a total of $83 million for Texas Children’s following the hospital’s Legacy of Motown Gala in Sept. 2018.

It’s been just over a year since Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower first opened its doors as the new home of heart, intensive care and surgery at Texas Children’s Medical Center campus. The cutting-edge, 640,000-square-foot facility allows Texas Children’s to continue providing the highest-quality care possible for the most critically ill children who come to us for help.

“When this tower was still under construction, we named it Legacy Tower,” said Mark Wallace, Texas Children’s president and CEO. “We knew this would be a place that would not only hold Texas Children’s legacy, but also the legacy of so many others, including our resilient patients and the dedicated team of caregivers who work hard each and every day to create healthier futures for children everywhere. Lester left so many legacies – his conviction and courage, his generosity, his triumphant spirit and his passion for life. Each of these legacies will be lived out every day in this building through the patients and families we serve.”

Prior to the official dedication, Lester’s daughter, Shelly, and her husband, Brian, along with his son Stuart and his wife, Limor, were surprised with the unveiling of two patient floors in the tower which were named in their honor by their late father.

“Lester brought so much joy to those he loves and cared for, and he often said that the most important thing we can do is care for the most vulnerable in our community – our children,” Sue Smith said. “We believe that the best place to heal sick children is right here at Texas Children’s, where all children are treated with the utmost compassion and expertise available, regardless of their family’s circumstances. That truly resonates with us and is what guides our giving.”

The first year in Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower was a busy one. As of May 2019, there had been 3,839 patient admissions in the pediatric and cardiac intensive care units. More than 9,000 patients received care at our outpatient Heart Center clinics, and over 700 catheterization and 476 MRI procedures were performed here.

A total of 3,455 surgeries were completed in the tower’s state-of-the-art surgical and cardiovascular operating rooms, totaling nearly 14,000 surgical hours. And since the tower’s helistop opened last November, Texas Children’s has had more than 120 landings, allowing for greater access to Texas Children’s for the sickest patients.

May 20, 2019

“I’m excited every day I walk into Legacy Tower,” said Dr. Lara Shekerdemian, service chief of Critical Care Services at Texas Children’s. “It is a wonderful environment to work in. Our patients and their families are very happy with their new spaces, and we are very privileged to be in our new home.”

It’s been one year since Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower opened its doors for the first time to care for our most critically ill patients at Texas Children’s Medical Center campus. And, in that short period of time, our patients and their families have noticed a positive difference since moving into the new tower.

“The rooms here are very cozy and very spacious,” said Eleonor Caparas, whose daughter is a PICU patient at Texas Children’s. “We have our own space here and we can stay together with my baby. I like it because I experienced the old PICU on the third floor of West Tower, and it is so different now.”

Randy Bowen, a PICU nurse at Texas Children’s for more than 25 years, recalls when critical care moved from the Abercrombie Building to West Tower. He says the move into Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower has been a huge game changer in the delivery of patient care.

“Coming into this space now, supplies us with so much flexibility and the availability of resources to provide the patient care that we’ve always excelled at doing,” Bowen said. “But I think now we’re exceeding that and it’s just been exciting be part of the whole process.”

Since Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower opened on May 22, 2018, Texas Children’s critical care, cardiology, surgical and radiology teams have been very busy caring for our hospital’s sickest patients.

To date, the new tower has had 3,839 patient admissions in the pediatric and cardiac intensive care units. More than 9,000 patients have received care at Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower’s outpatient Heart Center clinics, and over 700 catheterization and 239 intraoperative MRI procedures have been performed here.

A total of 3,455 surgeries have been completed in the tower’s state-of-the-art surgical and cardiovascular operating rooms, totaling 13,921 surgical hours. Since the tower’s helipad opened last November, Texas Children’s has had 123 landings, allowing for greater access to Texas Children’s for the sickest patients.

“We have everything under one roof to take care of all of the sickest children,” said Texas Children’s Surgeon-in-Chief Larry Hollier. “All of the diagnostic capability, the OR capability, the interventional radiology capability and then the ICU care. After visiting all of the leading children’s hospitals across the country, I can say without a doubt, no other children’s hospital has something like Legacy Tower.”

 

In May of 2018, Texas Children’s reached a historic milestone when the Lester and Sue Smith Legacy Tower opened its doors to care for our most critically ill patients. Four months later, Texas Children’s No. 1 ranked Heart Center moved into Smith Legacy Tower, marking the completion of the project and delivering on our promise to ensure every child receives the right care, at the right time, at the right place. Learn more by visiting our 2018 virtual Annual Report.