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In 2012, we began our journey to establish the first and only freestanding children’s hospital in San Antonio. As part of CHRISTUS Health, CHRISTUS Children’s is built on sacred ground where the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word opened the city’s first hospital in 1869 to care for a community suffering from an outbreak of cholera.  

In 2013, we formed an academic partnership with Baylor College of Medicine and today we have 170 faculty members providing medical services to children and expectant mothers. Baylor College of Medicine consistently ranks among the top medical schools in the U.S. and has been named the best in Texas for clinical research. In total, we have more than 600 credentialed medical staff members, 125 advanced practice providers (nurse practitioners and physician associates), 39 pediatric residents, and nearly 600 nurses. We employ more than 1,400 Associates at our downtown campus.  

Our patient care areas have been renovated to include all private rooms with sleeping accommodations for a parent or partner in the maternal care areas. We have an onsite Ronald McDonald House where families can stay while their child is undergoing treatment. In 2018, we became the first hospital in South Texas to earn Magnet Designation for nursing excellence. In addition, we are the only hospital in the U.S. to maintain the Gold Level Beacon Award in both our Pediatric and Neonatal Intensive Care Units. In 2018, we received recognition as a Baby-Friendly hospital in 2018, meeting the highest standard of care for infant nutrition.    

In fiscal year 2021, nearly 6,000 children and maternal patients were admitted; we performed more than 4,500 surgeries and handled 45,000 emergency cases. More than 200,000 children and expectant mothers were cared for in our more than 50 outpatient specialty clinics in five locations.   

In 2015, we opened the Max and Minnie Tomerlin Voelcker Clinical Research Center that has nearly 200 active research studies supported by $5.3 million in state, federal and foundation grants. The ALL KIDZ Critical Care Transport Team has team of nurses and respiratory therapists available to transfer patients by helicopter, airplane and ambulance. Since the program’s inception in 1990, the team has transferred more than 20,000 patients who required the expert care found at our hospital. Our areas of expertise include the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) program for which our team has earned a Gold Level Center of Excellence designation by the Extracorporeal Life Support Organization.