By Greg Forester, Staff Writer
The University Medical Center at Princeton will team up with one of the nation’s most prestigious pediatric hospitals to provide joint medical services for children at the Princeton hospital, beginning this summer.
An agreement with the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia means physicians, assistants and other personnel from the world-renowned institution will be on site at Princeton, hospital officials announced Friday.
They will work in two units at the Witherspoon Street facility — to be called the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Pediatric Care Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Newborn Care at University Medical Center at Princeton.
The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia contingent — known as hospitalists for their special focus on hospital medicine — will be on hand in Princeton 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for assisting in the care of children, according to the agreement between the two hospitals.
”(This deal) is the result of a great deal of hard work by many physicians and administrators at both institutions,” said Barry S. Rabner, president of Princeton HealthCare System, the hospital’s parent nonprofit corporation.
Other parts of the agreement stipulate Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia personnel will be available for high-risk births and for other pregnancy issues and for consultation in the emergency department and at the hospital’s Well Baby Nursery.
In addition, Princeton personnel now will have access to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia educational services and programs.
Parents magazine ranked The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia first overall in the 2009 Best Children’s Hospitals issue.
Also, U.S. News and World Report has ranked The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia first among U.S. pediatric hospitals for six consecutive years.
The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, one of the nation’s oldest and well-known children’s facilities, is located adjacent to the University of Pennsylvania campus in West Philadelphia.
Personnel at the 400-bed hospital serve as the pediatrics department of the Penn School of Medicine.

