Nursing at MassGeneral Hospital for Children
Nurses at MassGeneral Hospital for Children are committed to providing the best possible care for children and families.
We know that the time of a child’s diagnosis and treatment is very stressful and we strive to provide an open, welcoming environment. We believe parents know their children best and parents, along with primary care providers, are our partners in a child's care and have an active voice in all treatment plans.
Caring for the Whole Child
Our nurses are specialists in the care of children, and provide care that is technically advanced and developmentally appropriate. The pediatric nursing staff works to influence an environment of healing for each individual child by meeting their personal needs, spiritual needs, and holistic needs of play and creativity.
Part of the larger community of nursing services at Massachusetts General Hospital, pediatric nursing practice is driven by a spirit of inquiry, compassion, appreciation of life-long learning and a willingness to share our expertise with others.
Magnet Nursing Status: First in Massachusetts
On September 8, 2003, the American Nurses Association awarded its highest honor for nursing excellence—Magnet Nursing Services Recognition—to Massachusetts General Hospital. MassGeneral was the first hospital in Massachusetts to achieve Magnet Nursing Status, a distinction that has been awarded to fewer than three percent of all hospitals.
Public Accountability
MassGeneral Hospital for Children is rated by Patients First, a service of the Massachusetts Hospital Association, which ensures you will have access to information you need to make the best health care choices for you and your family. We’re proud of what we’ve done to improve quality and safety, and our commitment is ongoing.
Our Mission
MassGeneral Hospital for Children is dedicated to providing outstanding, personalized, developmentally appropriate care for infants, children, and adolescents within the context of their family and community.
We recognize that pediatric care is the beginning of the health care journey, and we are committed to providing the best possible care for life. We honor diversity, we encourage open discussion, and we respect the parent’s and child’s right to participate in the planning of their care.
We are advanced in our understanding of illness by sound medical research and education, empowered by skill and technology and motivated by a commitment to excellence in pediatric practice that is sincere and compassionate.
Guiding Principles
-
We recognize the importance of the family in the child’s life. We respect the family with its strengths, individual cultures and different methods of coping. We allow the child/family to define ‘family’.
-
We accept accountability for the care we deliver and the system where we deliver that care. We are always attempting to improve health care for children and families, with systems improvement, medical research and in the physical environment.
-
We provide a family-centered approach to care. We impart service, which is respectful, caring and personalized.
-
We recognize the importance of family/professional collaboration and foster this collaboration at all levels of the health care system. We respect the family’s right to have complete and unbiased information about its child, shared in a supportive manner. We encourage the family (and child)* to participate in the decision making process of the health care plan.
-
We understand and incorporate the developmental and psychosocial needs of the infant, child, adolescent and family into our care.
-
We acknowledge that we are most effective as a team and we regard the child and the family as valuable members of that team.
-
We enhance patient care and the systems supporting children’s services as we work with others, eagerly entering into new partnerships with individuals, groups and systems within and outside of Massachusetts General Hospital.
-
We view learning as a lifelong process essential to the growth and development of clinicians. We accept our responsibility to educate our new professionals and expand the knowledge of our entire staff who care for children and their families.
-
We acknowledge that maintaining the highest standards of Family-Centered Care is a priority. We will make decisions based on the most effective use of internal and external resources, realizing this is a never-ending process that involves all members of the institution, our patients and families, as well as the community at large.
-
We honor the spirit of every child
For more information about nursing at Massachusetts General Hospital, please visit Patient Care Services.
