Busy parents and sick children aren’t always on the same wavelength. Between work, school and play schedules, getting kids to the hospital for appointments, tests, treatments, surgery and other procedures can be a struggle. To make families’ lives easier, and to ensure that children throughout our community have access to the best possible health care, Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital (YNHCH) is spreading its wings—establishing outpatient Pediatric Specialty Centers conveniently located beyond the confines of the main facility.
While YNHCH continues to be the well-known hub, providing a comprehensive range of inpatient medical care for children—from newborns to teens—the Pediatric Specialty Centers offer specialty services on an outpatient basis.
Along with the flagship Pediatric Specialty Center on the second floor of YNHCH, other centers are located at One Long Wharf in New Haven and at 747 Belden Avenue in Norwalk. They all offer convenient access to board-certified pediatric specialists in a wide variety of pediatric specialties, including adolescent medicine, endocrinology, gastroenterology, nephrology, orthopedics, urology, and general surgery. Radiology services, such as x-ray, fluoroscopy and ultrasound, and pediatric phlebotomy are available. Pediatric treatment centers offering infusion therapy for children with cancer are located at 405 Church Street in Guilford and on the seventh floor of the Smilow Cancer Hospital.
Ebony Wright, RN, plays an important role—and brings a personal perspective—as both a manager and a clinical nurse for the Pediatric Specialty Center at YNHCH. Not only was this New Haven native born in the hospital where she’s been working for nearly 15 years, but during that time earned her college degree in nursing with the assistance of an employee scholarship from Yale New Haven Hospital.
“As a manager, I oversee the scheduling for our nurses and PCAs,” says Wright, who began her career at YNHH as a business associate. During her nursing shifts, she’s an integral member of the center’s multidisciplinary team. “We huddle each morning and review our schedule of patients coming in that day.”
Wright or one of the other staff members greets the children and their families, takes the patient’s vital signs and escorts the child to the examination room where the physician will see them.
This collaborative procedure distinguishes YNHH’s commitment to family-centered care. “We have patients seeing multiple physicians, so having all the pediatric specialists at each center allows families to schedule everything for one day at one location that’s convenient for them,” Wright says. “We’re trying to make sure everyone in the community has access to all of the physicians and great services we offer.”
