MU Children’s Hospital offers a variety of programs to enrich our pediatric patients’ lives during their experience at our facility.
From our Books for Babies program in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit to our patient and family assistance program, we want to make a true and lasting difference in the lives of our patients and their families by providing the best and most reliable care.
Books for Babies: This program helps new parents assist in the care of their infant in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). When a child arrives in the NICU, his or her parents receive a children’s book. At the start of every month, the parents receive another new book. The baby’s footprints are on the inside cover of each book, giving the parents a way to see their baby’s growth. Golden Books are perfect donations for the Books for Babies program.
Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Services: The pediatric unit of the Missouri Psychiatric Center serves children ages five to 18 who require acute psychiatric care. The average stay for these patients is five to seven days. Items such as craft, art, holiday and birthday party supplies; small toys and treats that serve as incentive prizes for good behavior; sensory basket items like journals, massagers, and music that help soothe and relax; video game equipment like games and controllers for the Wii; as well as clothing items like socks and underwear assist the treatment team in creating a positive healing environment and are greatly appreciated.
Happiness for Health: Happiness for Health provides sick and injured children with toys, stuffed animals, games and parties to make a difficult, and sometimes frightening, hospital stay more bearable. You can help by donating items for kids, such as games, toys, stuffed animals, birthday balloons, party hats, birthday plates and napkins.
Memorial Giving: Your tax-deductible gift can honor a family member or friend and:
- Support pediatric research
- Purchase equipment for the NICU
- Provide patient and family assistance
- Provide a happy memory to a child in the hospital
- Help one more pediatric patient beat cancer or other life-threatening diseases
Patient and Family Assistance: The patient and family assistance program helps patients who might not have the necessary resources to be able to fulfill all of their medical expenses. This program allows us to make our services available to everyone in the community and to assist families incurring those “extra” expenses that come with having a child hospitalized. You can help by donating gas gift cards, hotel lodging, baby clothes, restaurant gift cards, snack items and anything else that may assist the family during this stressful occasion.
Reach Out and Read: Reach Out and Read prepares our youngest patients to succeed in school by partnering with doctors to prescribe books and encourage families to read together. The program builds on the unique relationship between parents and medical providers and works to develop early critical reading skills in children, beginning at six months of age. The program begins at the six-month checkup and continues through age five. At the five-year checkup, children are given book bags with stickers, coloring books and other reading enrichment goodies. Gifts to this program will purchase books and “book bag” goodies.
Donate to MU Children’s Hospital