Overview

Cardinal Glennon Children’s Medical Center is a not-for-profit 190-bed inpatient and outpatient pediatric medical center. As the nation’s only free-standing, Catholic children’s hospital, Cardinal Glennon has provided care for children regardless of ability to pay since 1956. Cardinal Glennon primarily serves children from eastern Missouri and southern Illinois, but also treats children across the United States and from countries around the world.

Cardinal Glennon also serves as a teaching hospital affiliated with the neighboring Saint Louis University

Saint Louis University

Saint Louis University is a private, co-educational Jesuit university located in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in 1818 by the Most Reverend Louis Guillaume Valentin Dubourg SLU is the oldest university west of the Mississippi River. It is one of 28 member institutions of the...

 Schools of Medicine and Nursing, and nine other education institutes. Cardinal Glennon is a member of SSM Health Care

SSM Health Care

SSM Health Care is a Catholic, not-for-profit health care system with an international reputation as a pioneer in the use of quality measures to improve care. With 5,400 physicians and 22,000 employees in four states, SSM is one of the largest employers in every community it serves. It is located...

, one of the largest Catholic health care systems in the country. SSM is sponsored by the Franciscan Sisters of Mary

Franciscan Sisters of Mary

The Franciscan Sisters of Mary is a Roman Catholic religious congregation for women based in St. Louis, Missouri that founded hospitals throughout the Midwest....

 and owns, operates and manages 19 acute care hospitals in four states — Missouri

Missouri

Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

 and Oklahoma

Oklahoma

Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...

. In 2002, SSM was the first health care organization in the country to be named a Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award

Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award

The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award recognizes U.S. organizations in the business, health care, education, and nonprofit sectors for performance excellence. The Baldrige Award is the only formal recognition of the performance excellence of both public and private U.S. organizations given by...

 winner.

History

Originally named “Cardinal Glennon Memorial Hospital for Children” after John Cardinal Glennon, the Archbishop of St. Louis from 1903 to 1946, SSM Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center first opened its doors in July 1956. It was the Archbishop's mission to see a health care facility open to all children in need of medical care.

The sun displayed prominently atop the SSM Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center name has been the hospital's symbol for many years. It means hope, warmth, caring, commitment, and excellence.

Exceptional Departments

Cardinal Glennon is home to physician experts in more than 60 areas of pediatric medical specialties including cardiology, critical care, rehabilitation, pulmonology, minimally invasive surgery, fetal surgery, hematology/oncology, sleep disorders, weight management and others.

The hospital is home to the Level 1 pediatric trauma center and a Level 3 neonatal intensive care unit, both the highest available classification, and the St. Louis Fetal Care Institute. The St. Louis Fetal Care Institute is the only comprehensive fetal care center in middle America.

In addition, the hospital offers:

• The St. Louis Cord Blood Bank, the world’s second largest public banks of life-saving cord blood stem cells (derived ethically from the umbilical cord and placenta, rather than fetal tissue).
• Bob Costas Cancer Center, including a 16-bed in-patient unit, a day hospital and a stem cell transplant unit.
• The Dana Brown Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, the first all-private 60-bed unit of its kind.
• The Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, a 19-bed unit, with private rooms for every child.
• The Dorothy and Larry Dallas Heart Center, bringing together diagnosis and treatment of pediatric heart issues.
• The Dan Dierdorf Pediatric Emergency and Trauma Center, the state’s first and longest-running Level I Trauma Center, which saw more than 46,000 patients in 2009.
• The Missouri Poison Center, which handles more than 190,000 adult and child poison exposure calls each year.
• The Knights of Columbus Developmental Center, providing exams and care for children with developmental disabilities such as autism.
• The School Partnership program, which partners with the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis to provide nurse screenings of parochial school students for vision, hearing and blood pressure.

The "Firsts"

Cardinal Glennon was the first medical center to:

• living-related liver transplant and split liver transplant in Missouri
• infant kidney transplant in Missouri
• Cleft Palate, Genetics and Neurofibromatosis clinics in the state
• Pediatric Sleep Disorders program and Lab in St. Louis
• hospital in the region to provide fully trained pediatricians in the Emergency Department 24 hours a day
• Level I Pediatric Trauma Center in the state
• only dedicated Pediatric Rehabilitation Unit in Missouri
• only hospital in region to establish a Cord Blood Bank and one of the first four in the nation
• Poison Control Center in the Missouri and the third busiest in the nation
• first board-certified medical toxicologist in the St. Louis region
• to perform a laparoscopic node dissection for Genito Urinary cancer in a child
• first to set up molecular DNA testing of the most inherited form of mental retardation (Fragile-X syndrome) in Missouri

Commitment to Excellent Care

In 2010, Cardinal Glennon welcomed 46,157 patients to the emergency department. The hospital had a total of 6,964 admissions with physicians performing 1,806 inpatient and 5,844 outpatient surgeries.
There are over 575 physicians and about 550 nurses on staff. In addition, Cardinal Glennon embraces over 41,000 hours of volunteer service every year.

Expansion

Since 1996, more than $200 million has been invested in facility expansion. In 2009, Cardinal Glennon opened the St. Louis Fetal Care Institute.

Coming soon: A “hybrid” cardiac surgery and catheterization suite that will save lives and reduce the number of surgeries required for heart patients, particularly very young infants.

Celebrity Supporters

World renowned sportscaster Bob Costas

Bob Costas

Robert Quinlan "Bob" Costas is an American sportscaster, on the air for the NBC network since the early 1980s.-Early life:...

 has provided a tremendous amount of support to Cardinal Glennon, annually hosting an event at the Fabulous Fox Theatre that donates proceeds to the Children’s Medical Center, in addition to his sponsorship of the “Bob Costas Cancer Center.”
Former NFL St. Louis Rams Quarter-back Kurt Warner

Kurt Warner

Kurtis Eugene "Kurt" Warner is a retired American football player. He played quarterback for three National Football League teams: the St. Louis Rams, the New York Giants, and the Arizona Cardinals. He was originally signed by the Green Bay Packers as an undrafted free agent in 1994 after playing...

 sponsored the “Warner’s Corner,” an interactive playroom for pre-teen, and teenaged in-house patients.
Former American football player and current television sportscaster Dan Dierdorf

Dan Dierdorf

Daniel Lee "Dan" Dierdorf is a former American football player and current television sportscaster. He played 13 NFL seasons and has worked for ABC's Monday Night Football and CBS as a color commentator since retiring from football....

sponsored “The Dan Dierdorf Pediatric Emergency and Trauma Center.”

Research

The Pediatric Research Institute at SSM Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center operates to improve and assure the health and safety of children in the greater St. Louis area. By promoting research that advances the knowledge and management of childhood health and diseases, a number of nationally known physician-scientists from the Saint Louis University School of Medicine conduct research that can be applied to the clinical setting to improve disease prevention and treatment.
Ongoing programs include the study of pediatric infections and vaccine development, cardiac transplant rejection, liver diseases (particularly related to alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency and abnormal iron metabolism), metabolic diseases (Morquio Syndrome) and neonatal lung inflammation.