UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital Receives $3 Million to Establish Pediatric Disaster Care Center of Excellence

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary of Preparedness and Response (ASPR) awarded $3 million to University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital (UH Rainbow) to establish a Pediatric Disaster Care Center of Excellence.  

The grant will create the Eastern Great Lakes Pediatric Consortium for Disaster Response (EGLPCDR), one of only two Pediatric Disaster Care Centers of Excellence in the country. The EGLPCDR, led by UH Rainbow and accompanied by five other children’s hospitals in Michigan and Ohio, will provide a multi-pronged approach to address gaps across the disaster cycle spectrum of mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery for nearly seven million children.

“We face threats from disasters every day, which is why it is so important for hospitals, health care infrastructures, government and private entities to work together to create a coordinated emergency response model,” says Charles G. Macias, MD, MPH, Chief, Pediatric Emergency Medicine and Chief Quality Officer at UH Rainbow. “We are proud to be leading one of only two Pediatric Disaster Care Centers of Excellence in the country right here in Cleveland.”

Dr. Macias and Deanna Dahl-Grove, MD, pediatric emergency medicine at UH Rainbow, are co-primary investigators of the grant award. Dr. Dahl-Grove will lead the day-to-day activities of the EGLPCDR. “The grant award is the catalyst we need to harness and develop best-practices that are necessary to deliver the highest quality care before, during and after a disaster, especially for babies and children,” says Dr. Dahl Grove.

Each entity in EGLPCDR provides unique local and state level expertise (telemedicine, evidence-based clinical guidelines, simulation education, drill scenario expertise and special care units) and has integrated leadership roles within their respective Regional Healthcare Coalition.

The EGLPCDR includes:

• UH Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital
• Cincinnati Children’s Hospital
• CS Mott Children’s Hospital/University of Michigan
• Children’s Hospital of Michigan
• Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital/Spectrum Health
• Nationwide Children’s Hospital

UH Rainbow is the only designated Level 1 pediatric trauma center in northern Ohio. Located on UH Cleveland Medical Center’s main campus, UH Rainbow’s Pediatric Trauma Center complements UH’s coordinated regional adult trauma network which includes UH Cleveland Medical Center’s adult Level I trauma center, and four Level III trauma centers at UH Geauga Medical Center, a campus of UH Regional Hospitals, UH St. John Medical Center, UH Portage Medical Center and Southwest General Health Center in Middleburg Heights.