The funding project for expanding the Mississippi Children’s Hospital led by Kathy and Joe Sanderson has exceeded the campaign’s goal. The Sanderson Tower opened in November of 2020 and helped serve children during the peaks of the coronavirus pandemic. Pediatric Chair Dr. Mary Taylor says the facility goes beyond the call of healthcare to make sure children and their families are comfortable during treatment.
“In all of those intensive care unit areas, there’s places for the families to be, restrooms for the families in the rooms so they can stay with their child when they’re coming here from far away, says Dr. Taylor. “You know, this is a children’s hospital for the whole state of Mississippi. So some of our patients are transferred here from the Gulf Coast or from North Mississippi, and their families can be with their children here.”
The final donation for the campaign is a $2.5 million gift from the Gertrude C. Ford Foundation. While the facility has been in operation for more than a year, hospital officials say there is more work to be done. Dr. LouAnn Woodward is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Mississippi Medical Center. She says leaders have a long list of projects to come for both wings of the children’s hospital.
“We’ve actually got shell space in this building that can be built out and will be built out in the future. In our Batson Tower, we’ve got space that needs to be renovated,” says Dr. Woodward. “We are starting very soon the renovation of our children’s cancer clinic which is over in the lower level of the Batson Tower. We need to establish a child psychiatry unit, there’s not one in the state of Mississippi.”
Since its opening, hospital officials report around 13 thousand operations have been performed in the new building, as well as more than 63 thousand clinic visits.
