Parents and grandparents, pushing strollers, hauling backpacks and holding the hands of little ones, joined with dozens of nurses and other staff of the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) for a one-of-a-kind reunion Sunday at Akron Children’s Hospital.It was the first-ever PICU reunion, a special day to reconnect for families and staff, far removed from […]
From soccer fields to Capitol Hill, Ethan takes on juvenile arthritis
The symptoms of juvenile arthritis came on quickly for Ethan Berkovitz. The pain in his legs at age 8 was such that sometimes his father had to carry him onto the school bus. The good news was that after Dr. Steven Spalding, director of the Division of Rheumatology at Akron Children’s Hospital, diagnosed the disease […]
Child Advocacy Summit highlights urgent need for sweeping reforms
Akron Children’s Hospital on Tuesday hosted its first-ever Child Advocacy Summit, a call to action for public policies focused on children’s health and well-being, amid a troubling backdrop of poor outcomes on key health measures, persistent social problems in our communities and partisan rancor in our politics. The summit at the Hilton Akron/Fairlawn marked 40 […]
Madalynn Shanks has a message for Gen Z about IBD
Madalynn Shanks is an actress, singer, creative writer and aspiring filmmaker. At 14, she is driven and confident. She always was eager to talk about story ideas or the latest character she dreamed up. But now she is also eager to talk about a disease that has changed her life. Madalynn was diagnosed with ulcerative […]
Her young life spent in the NICU, Jaelee Hill finally goes home
Born extremely premature at 24 weeks, Jaelee Hill suffered a cascade of medical complications that kept her hospitalized for almost 16 months. She was so ill with pulmonary problems that at one point, her mother, Jennifer, was told to prepare for the worst. But on Thursday morning, the staff of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit […]
Pregnant and scared, Oklahoma mom finds her way to Akron Children’s Heart Center
Jessica Culbert was desperate for medical treatment to fix a defect in her heart’s electrical circuitry that caused an abnormally fast heartbeat. The defect, called supraventricular tachycardia, at times pushed Jessica’s heart rate as high as 240 beats per minute. She never knew when it might come on or how long it would last. It […]
