Department of Pediatrics

Education in the Department of Pediatrics

The Pediatric Residency Program offers a balance of outpatient and inpatient experiences with the opportunity for an extensive individualized curriculum that goes far beyond the requirements of the ACGME.

Residents in the Combined Internal Medicine/Pediatrics (Med/Peds) Residency Program are trained to the highest standards in pediatrics and internal medicine, so that they will be comfortable in both office and the hospital settings.

The Department of Pediatrics also offers rigorous subspecialty fellowship training programs in several fields. The department and Penn State Health Children's Hospital are large enough to give residents and fellows a broad scope of training in all aspects of general and sub-specialty pediatrics, yet small enough to provide personal instruction and mentoring.

Research in the Department of Pediatrics

Through research, clinicians and scientists seek to better understand disease mechanisms and enhance the treatment and prevention of childhood illnesses. Through these pursuits of research and discovery, access to innovative clinical trials and advanced therapies is available to patients at Penn State Health Children’s Hospital.

A variety of pediatric fields are rapidly advancing because of the expertise of pediatricians in fundamental science and clinical research, as well as the support of scientific and philanthropic organizations. Beat Childhood Cancer Research Consortium is a group of 50+ universities and children’s hospitals that offer a worldwide network of childhood cancer clinical trials, coordinated by Penn State Health Children’s Hospital and Penn State College of Medicine as the lead organization. The founder and chair of the Beat Childhood Cancer Research Consortium is Giselle Sholler, MD, the director of pediatric oncology research at Penn State College of Medicine and division chief of pediatric hematology/oncology for Penn State Health Children’s Hospital.

Children’s Miracle Network funds lifesaving equipment, vital patient programs and transformative research to help provide the best possible care to sick and injured children in our community. Every year, 40% of CMN’s funding is allocated to innovative pediatric research. These funds are critical at each point along the research journey, fueling ideas and discoveries to real-world solutions that have a huge impact on the lives of children.

Four Diamonds is dedicated to funding innovative research to develop improved treatments and cures for kids fighting cancer at Penn State Health Children’s Hospital and around the world. In the department of pediatrics, Four Diamonds supports a team of more than 90 doctors and scientists who are conducting full spectrum cancer research. This research includes learning more about how cancer forms and what can be done to destroy or reprogram cancer cells, developing new, more effective treatments and testing those treatments through clinical trials.

Specialized research programs in the department of pediatrics include:

• Center for Host Defense, Inflammation and Lung Disease Research (CHILD)
• Pediatric Cancer Research (Four Diamonds)
• ENRICH Consortium
• Neonatal Development Collaborative
• Pediatric Cardiovascular Research Center
• Pediatric Innovation Program

Department faculty are active in scholarly work; see recent publications here.

Clinical Care in the Department of Pediatrics

Every year, Penn State Health Children's Hospital is a destination for hope and healing for thousands of children and their families. As the only Level I pediatric trauma center between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, the hospital serves the most populous rural regions in the nation, with more than 1 million children in the referral area.

There are more than 20 specialty pediatric patient services in Hershey and numerous specialty services at more than 30 outpatient clinic locations throughout Pennsylvania.