It originally opened on May 19, 1922 as the Junior Red Cross Children's Hospital.[2] Its current building, opened on September 27, 2006, is the largest children's hospital in the prairie provinces and was the first free-standing pediatric facility to be built in Canada in more than 20 years.[citation needed] It is located west of the University of Calgary campus grounds and just across from the site of the Foothills Medical Centre.
Design
The Alberta Children's Hospital was designed with substantial input from young patients, as well as families, physicians and staff of the hospital. In 2002, architects created renderings of how the hospital could look; a multi-storey brick building. These drawings were brought to the hospital's Teen Advisory Group (TAG) and changed substantially into a colourful building closely resembling toy building blocks.[3]
The idea for the Alberta Children's Hospital was to create a building that would reduce stress and promote healing. The interior of the hospital has been designed to enable the delivery of family centred care. The hospital includes supports for families.
The Alberta Children's Hospital is used by patients from birth to age 18 from southern Alberta, southeastern British Columbia and southwestern Saskatchewan. It is an accredited pediatric level I trauma centre by the Trauma Association of Canada.[4] Additionally, the ACH is the provincial expert and referral centre for bone marrow transplantation, and is the leader in Western Canada (which is rapidly establishing itself as the national leader), for pediatric neurosciences. It also is the only pediatric hospital in Canada that consists of a comprehensive Behavioral Unit, is the world leader in congenital cataracts surgery, and has the largest pediatric vision clinic in all of Western Canada.[5]
The Alberta Children's Hospital Research Institute for Child and Maternal Health (ACHRI) is the Alberta Children's Hospital's affiliated research institute, and has a team of over 150 involved in the study of human development from embryo to adulthood.[6]
