Navicent Health

DECADES OF CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL MEDICINE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL, NAVICENT HEALTH BEGAN WHEN A GROUP OF DEDICATED PHYSICIANS WANTED TO PROVIDE COMPREHENSIVE MEDICAL CARE FOR INFANTS AND CHILDREN. Central Georgia in the 1970s and '80s had limited options for the care of very sick children. Hospitalized children were cared for by their private practice pediatricians, and neonatal intensive care units (NNICUs) were only found in larger cities. To meet a growing need, Navicent Health, then known as Medical Center of Central Georgia, recruited Kenneth C. Henderson, MD, pediatrician and neonatologist, in 1975 to establish the NNICU. e founding of the medical school at Mercer University in the early 1980s helped attract more specialists to the area, including those who concentrated on children's medicine, including Frank Bowyer, MD, pediatric endocrinologist. Other physicians, such as Lowell Clark, MD, pediatric intensivist and Director of Pediatric Procedural Sedation Service at CHNH, came to the hospital for their own reasons. "I had planned to do family practice in rural Georgia and be a country doctor," Dr. Clark says. "When I started working in the NNICU with Dr. Henderson, I was smitten. I did a pediatric residency and came back to Macon to work with the children." "I came to Macon in 1976 to start the heart surgery program," says Sam Shaker,MD, pediatric surgeon with Navicent Health. "I had training in pediatric surgery, so I cared for children and newborns who needed those services as well." By 1985, it became clear that Macon needed a dedicated children's hospital. In 1986, community physicians signed a letter of support for the establishment of a children's hospital. "Even though we started simply, we knew where we were going," Dr. Henderson says. "For a children's hospital, patient care has to be excellent. Second, medical education becomes important, and research is the next phase that's coming. It has to be built on excellent patient care." Visit www.navicenthealth.org/childrens to learn more. " " "Without the suppor t of the communit y, we would not have Children's Hospital, Navicent Health today. We need ever yone who brought us here to be involved in the nex t step. You build a children's hospital a brick at a time, step by step. We appreciate the communit y's continued suppor t." Fr ank Bow yer, MD, p ediatric endocrinol ogis t w ith CHNH "We're able to give personalized care to families—to really sit down and talk with them. We need the continued suppor t of others to ser ve children and their families with the highest possible level of care." L owell Cl ark , MD, p ediatric int ensi v is t and Dir ec t or o f Pediatric Pr oc edur al Sedation Ser v ic e at CHNH The original signers of the letter of support for establishing a children's hospital are shown at the 20th anniversary in 2007. NAVICENTHEALTH.ORG/FOUNDATION | Impact | 23 HOSPITAL HISTORY

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