Pediatric Specialty Care in Chicago

[music]

I'm Terry Lynn and I was born with a cleft lip and palette. This place helps change the lives of kids like me.

I'm Evan, her brother, and I was also born with a cleft lip and palette.

And this is where you come for your doctor's appointments.

Shriners Chicago also treats kids with orthopedic conditions or injuries to their bones and joints. or maybe their back hurts and it's harder to stand cuz their spine is really curved. Other doctors care for kids who need rehabilitation to play and move better.

There are 27 exam rooms, doctors, physician assistants, and nurses handle 20,000 visits in the clinic every year.

I'm Caleb and I come to Shiners Chicago for cerebral palsy care. Welcome to the POPS department right in the clinic.

The people who work in this department measure and fit prosthetics or artificial limbs and orthotic devices like braces. These devices help kids do the things they love. All devices are custom made. We get to choose the color and design. Besides pops, some families in the clinic also see a clinical nutritionist, psychologist, or therapist right in their clinic.

I'm Chase and this is radiology where they'll take pictures of your bones to help diagnose orthopedic issues. We have a special X-ray machine that uses one quarter of the radiation of a traditional X-ray device. That's helpful for kids who need a lot of X-rays. It has the ability to take two spine views at once. The other colorful X-ray rooms can take any kind of imaging the doctors request.

I am Phil. This is where families come for surgery. Behind this wall is four operating rooms. This area also has the pediatric intensive care unit.

Down the hall is our check-in area. This is where you'll meet your surgeon, anesthesia, and our friendly nurses. Doctors at Shriners combine multiple surgeries when possible. This makes it more convenient for kids and families, like doing your ear tubes when you have a lip repair. Both our spine and cranial facial teams use a 3D printed model from CT or MRI scans. This helps them plan for complicated surgeries for our kids.

Hi, I'm Abby and this is one of my favorite places in the hospital, the motion analysis center. This place helps me see how far I've come in my cerebral palsy.

And I'm Nancy, a physical therapist. Here in the motion analysis center, we use the same technology as video games and movies to record how our patients move.

During motion analysis, we wear small sticky marker dots. Special cameras track their positions.

We create a motion analysis from the markers and other measurements like walking speed and the force when you step. Our physical therapists and biomedical engineers work with doctors to use the results to help plan and evaluate treatments. The center is also used for research. Chicago has more than a million dollars in annual research funding to improve the care of kids everywhere.

This is pediatric therapy. I'm Jenna, a physical therapist. Shriners Chicago provides the therapy appropriate for your child, whether they need inpatient or outpatient care. The goal of therapy is to help kids be independent or do well at home, school, and life after an illness, injury, or surgery.

I'm Brian, an occupational therapist. We have over 20 physical, occupational, and speech therapists. We all work hard to make treatment fun for our patients. We have multiple therapy gyms and a large activity mall for therapy. Each year, our department handles nearly 20,000 appointments.

Hi, I'm James. Behind me is the inpatient unit. This is where kids stay after surgery or during impatient therapy. You get your own private room. Kids also get infusions to strengthen their bones. While you're here, you might do art with child life. Recreational therapy might teach you a sport or how to grow plants. There's a cool indoor activity mall in a large backyard.

Shriner's Children cares for kids with insurance, without insurance, and kids on Medicaid. This allows doctors to consider all options for a child regardless of family's ability to pay.

Thanks for taking our tour.

You can visit Shriners Chicago.org to learn more.

Thank you for taking our tour. I hope you loved it.

[End title card: Shriners Children’s Chicago logo]

Speaker 1:

So it's been 13 or 14 years since I've been back, so it was really weird, like driving up my parents and I we were going, "Oh wait we remember this. Wait this doesn't look familiar and then pulling in I think all three of us were kind of hit with memories and flashbacks. I came up here when I was three and a half so that would have been a really long time ago. I came up here to Chicago because of the SCI unit, the spinal cord injury unit, and since I was diagnosed with transverse myelitis. It is a spinal cord injury so Chicago was the best one, so that's where I came.