Welcome

Bradley Warady, MD
Interim Chair

With over 300 faculty members in our divisions, sections, and centers of excellence, the Department of Pediatrics at Children’s Mercy Hospitals and Clinics is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the country.  We are also the Department of Pediatrics for the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine, a combined baccalaureate/MD degree program. The Department of Pediatrics also participates in educational and medical exchange programs with Guangzhou Children’s Hospital in China; Hospital del Nino in Panama City, Panama; and the nation of Mexico.

A few of our recent Department of Pediatrics honors and distinctions include:

• “America’s Best Children’s Hospitals” in - Diabetes & Endocrine, Digestive disorders, and Respiratory disorders (US News and World Report - 2009)
• Our Infectious Disease section was selected as the pediatric site in partnership with the University of Iowa NIH Vaccine Trial Evaluation Unit (VTEU) and recently conducted pediatric clinical trials for the 2009 H1N1 influenza vaccine.
• Top 25 “Best Children’s Hospitals” (Parents magazine  - 2008)
• Top 5 Pediatric Emergency Departments (Child magazine - 2007)

Innovation
Department of Pediatrics faculty are involved in many of the nation’s most innovative programs including the:

• Center for Personalized Medicine and Therapeutic Innovation, under the direction of Stephen Spielberg, MD, PhD 
• Children's Mercy Bioethics Center, under the direction of John Lantos, MD 
• Center for Infant Pulmonary Disorders, under the direction of William Truog, MD 
• Center for Pediatric Excellence in Resuscitation under the direction of Christopher Kennedy, MD and Robert Schremmer, MD 

Research 
The Department of Pediatrics fosters a collaborative research environment characterized by projects that span multiple subspecialties and range in scope from clinical/applied through basic. Many of our faculty have been recipients of significant extramural research funding from the National Institutes of Health (including ARPA funds), disease-based foundations and private concerns which support biomedical research. Additionally, Children's Mercy Hospital maintains an active and aggressive intramural research program with over 10 competitive, peer-reviewed grants available annually. The Department of Pediatrics is home to two multicenter grants funded by NIH; the Chronic Kidney Disease Center (CKiD) Network and one of the 13 Pediatric Pharmacology Research Network (PPRU) sites in the U.S., now in its 16th consecutive year of support.

Education
Our educational programs are committed to providing an exceptional learning environment that fosters competency-based education for a diverse group of trainees from across the United States and other countries. Students from the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine have ranked the 8 week pediatrics core rotation #1. Our core residency training program in pediatrics is respected for its focus on resident advocacy and development of programs in research, quality and patient and family centered care. We fully integrate medicine-pediatrics residents into our curriculum and support a residency program in child neurology and 14 pediatric fellowships.