W I Cook Foundation Inc

About Cook Children's Health Care System For more than 100 years Cook Children's Health Care System has worked to fulfill its Promise to improve the health of every child through the prevention and treatment of illness, disease and injury. As a not-for-profit, nationally-recognized and integrated pediatric health care organization based in Fort Worth, Texas, Cook Children's comprises 14 entities. They include a medical center, physician network, health plan, home health company, health foundation, a child study center, two surgery centers and more. Cook Children's reputation for excellence draws patients from near and far. Families travel from across Texas and the United States, as well as internationally, to receive life-saving pediatric care and benefit from the collaboration and vast resources the system offers. In addition to the medical center, a network of more than 60 primary, specialty and urgent care locations provide numerous access points to life-saving pediatric care that's family-centered and built on leading technology, collaboration and a best-in-class patient experience. Cook Children's Health Foundation Dollars gifted through Cook Children's Health Foundation (CCHF) impact almost every Cook Children's program and patient. From technology upgrades to research to facility expansions to new services and charity care, running a health system that records more than 1 million patient encounters a year requires a robust philanthropic arm. It cannot be done without the support of generous donors. A safety net for uncompensated care The Cook Children's Health Foundation provides a critical financial safety net for the health system and those it serves. Because of the pandemic, that safety net required a much wider cast in both 2020 and 2021. A devastating example of the critical need for a safety net is the escalation of acuity among patients seeking help from Cook Children's Behavioral Health services. The Cook Children's Health Foundation has always provided a hefty amount of funding for this service, as the majority of its patients are typically uninsured or underinsured. In 2021, the rate at which children presented with severe anxiety and depression soared. In March 2021, Cook Children's Medical Center reported record numbers of suicides and attempted suicides with patients as young as 7, and it marked the first time suicide became the leading cause of trauma death, surpassing child abuse and car wrecks. Thanks in large part to gifts made through CCHF, children needing mental and emotional care are provided behavioral health services even when their own financial resources are limited. Uncompensated care is more than just charity care. Donations to CCHF help fund a number of non-revenue producing healing programs at Cook Children's that otherwise would not exist. The Sit...Stay...Play facility dog program is a favorite. After all, nothing can calm an anxious child reeling from a medical crisis like the comfort of a cuddly canine. Similar Child Life programs such as music therapy, art, camps and the Child Life Zone offer a different kind of "medicine" that allows kids to do what kids do best...imagine, create, play and have fun! Meeting the mental, emotional and spiritual needs of patients and their families is just as critical as treating their medical condition, and these services do just that free-of-charge to patients. The Cook Children's Health Foundation also funds scholarships to Child Study Center at Cook Children's. This center provides children who have complex developmental and behavioral disabilities the care and education they need to achieve their full potential. Innovation Fuels Capital Growth None of these services would be possible without capital growth. Advanced equipment must be purchased and maintained. Facilities must be built to house these technologies and services where children can access them closer to their homes. Without capital funds children would be deprived of life-changing, life-advancing and life-saving medical care. Recent capital investments include adding facilities in Prosper, Carrollton and Fort Worth's Walsh Ranch with primary care, urgent care and orthopedics services. In 2020, the Prosper campus grew to include an outpatient surgery center, outpatient imaging and lab services, and a number of specialty care services. Expansion of this campus continues with the construction of an inpatient medical center that will add an emergency department, operating rooms, a medical/surgical unit and pediatric intensive care unit. The medical center's steel structure was completed in December 2021 with the opening set for early FY22. Like all organizations, Cook Children's faced many challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. Leadership used the unique circumstances as an opportunity to identify, assess and plan for current and future needs for system-wide operational coordination, crisis management and infectious disease control. In response, CCHF kicked off its Protecting Your Tomorrows capital campaign in 2021. The campaign will fund construction of a year-round solutions center that will coordinate daily operational needs for the entire Cook Children's Health Care System, and will house dedicated space for an incident command center. This project includes a new six-bed infectious diseases critical care unit (CCU) and a 32-bed medical surgical unit. An existing 20-bed unit will be used as a dedicated infectious diseases unit on an as-need basis for the treatment of non-critical contagious patients such as those hospitalized for flu, COVID-19, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and other viruses. The project will be complete in FY22. All of this, clinical advancement and capital growth-requires the support of the Cook Children's Health Foundation and, by extension, the generosity of donors and community partners. These patrons don't just help us advance our Promise; they become a part of the Promise and impact pediatric health care for generations to come.