Seamless Care

The Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia provides comprehensive care for the mother carrying a fetus with a known birth defect, before and after birth. For the part in the middle — the baby’s delivery — the mother goes to the adjacent Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, because Children’s Hospital has no delivery facilities.

Soon, that will change. Children’s Hospital plans to open a specialized obstetric care and delivery unit in the Hospital itself as another component to its world-class fetal medicine and neonatal surgical programs. The unit will be named for the Garbose Family in recognition of a major gift from Lynne and William Garbose to support the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment.

The new eight-bed unit will allow Children’s Hospital experts in fetal medicine and surgery to provide comprehensive, seamless care from before birth through and after delivery. The project’s leaders expect the unit to improve outcomes for children with fetal abnormalities, as well as their mothers.

N. Scott Adzick, M.D., director of the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment, predicts the new unit will provide an environment more conducive to developing and perfecting fetal treatments to cure disease. Peggy Gordin, R.N., director of Neonatal Nursing, expects it will eliminate some challenges and improve the care given now.

“We know that these babies will need special care when they’re born, and (with the new unit) we won’t have to deal with them being born in one institution and transferred to Children's Hospital,” Gordin said. “Right now we do reasonably well with that, but it could be better.”

Lori Howell, R.N., M.S., executive director of the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment, said additional funding is vital to ensure families are provided with everything they need. “We’ll look to the support of our donors to help us create the best environment possible for the patients we serve,” she said, citing the need for increased family services and new equipment for the unit.

The Garbose Family Special Delivery Unit is scheduled to open in June of 2008.