Evelina London Children's Hospital is a specialist NHS

hospital A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically has an emerge ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. It is administratively a part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and provides

teaching hospital A teaching hospital is a hospital or medical centre that provides medical education and training to future and current health professionals. Teaching hospitals are almost always affiliated with one or more universities and are often co-located ...

facilities for London South Bank University and

King's College London School of Medicine GKT School of Medical Education (abbreviated: GKT) is the medical school of King's College London. The school has campuses at three institutions, Guy's Hospital (Southwark), King's College Hospital (Denmark Hill) and St Thomas' Hospital (Lambet ...

. Formerly housed at

Guy's Hospital Guy's Hospital is an NHS hospital in the borough of Southwark in central London. It is part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and one of the institutions that comprise the King's Health Partners, an academic health science centre. ...

Southwark Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed ...

, it moved to a new building alongside

St Thomas' Hospital St Thomas' Hospital is a large NHS teaching hospital in Central London, England. It is one of the institutions that compose the King's Health Partners, an academic health science centre. Administratively part of the Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foun ...

Lambeth Lambeth () is a district in South London, England, in the London Borough of Lambeth, historically in the County of Surrey. It is situated south of Charing Cross. The population of the London Borough of Lambeth was 303,086 in 2011. The area expe ...

on 31 October 2005.

History

Plaque on the site of the Evelina Hospital - geograph

The hospital was founded in 1869 (as Evelina Hospital for Sick Children) by

Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild (17 December 1839 – 17 December 1898), also known as Ferdinand James Anselm Freiherr von Rothschild, was a British Jewish banker, art collector and politician who was a member of the prominent Rothschild family ...

, whose wife,

Evelina ''Evelina, or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World'' is a novel written by English author Fanny Burney and first published in 1778. Although published anonymously, its authorship was revealed by the poet George Huddesford in wh ...

, and their child had died in premature labour. It was established in a purpose-built hospital in

Southwark Bridge Road Southwark Bridge Road is a road in Southwark, London, England, between Newington Causeway near Elephant and Castle and Southwark Bridge across the River Thames, leading to the City of London, in a meandering route. The road was created by conn ...

, opposite what was originally the headquarters of the

London Fire Brigade The London Fire Brigade (LFB) is the fire and rescue service for London, the capital of the United Kingdom. It was formed by the Metropolitan Fire Brigade Act 1865, under the leadership of superintendent Eyre Massey Shaw. It has 5,992staff, in ...

at 94

. It was brought under the management of

in 1947 and became part of the

National Health Service The National Health Service (NHS) is the umbrella term for the publicly funded healthcare systems of the United Kingdom (UK). Since 1948, they have been funded out of general taxation. There are three systems which are referred to using the " ...

in 1948. In 1976 the original hospital building was closed, and the children's wards were moved to the newly built Guy's Tower. In 1999 a decision was made to re-establish Evelina Children's Hospital as a new specialist hospital for all children's services at Guy's and St Thomas', in

, on the site of a former nurses' home. An architectural design competition was managed by RIBA Competitions and won by Hopkins Architects and engineers

Buro Happold Buro Happold (previously ''BuroHappold Engineering'') is a British professional services firm that provides engineering consultancy, design, planning, project management, and consulting services for buildings, infrastructure, and the environment ...

. Davis Langdon provided quantity surveying and employer's agent services. Construction began in 2002, and the building was completed in 2004, ready for fitting out. The building won the IStructE Award for Education or Healthcare Structures in 2006. In the same year, after a Europe-wide heatwave, the building's project team were recalled following reports of high indoor temperatures. In 2018, it was announced that the Duchess of Cambridge would become the hospital's patron.

Funding

Although a part of the NHS, the £60 million building cost of the new Evelina London Children's Hospital was largely paid for with private funds, with £50 million coming from the independent Guy's and St Thomas' Charity (the successor to the endowments of Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild, amongst others), and £10 million from NHS budgets and a major fundraising campaign by the Evelina London Children's Charity.

Fundraising

In June 2020, aged five and inspired by

Captain Tom Moore Captain Sir Thomas Moore (30 April 1920 – 2 February 2021), more popularly known as Captain Tom, was a British Army officer and fundraiser who made international headlines in 2020 when he raised money for charity in the run-up to his 100th bir ...

's NHS fundraising during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

Tony Hudgell Antony Hudgell (born 8 October 2014 as Antony Simpson), is an English Fundraising, fundraiser and recipient of the Pride of Britain Award and Points of Light#United_Kingdom_Points_of_Light, UK Points of Light award. In 2020, aged five, inspired ...

set out to raise £500 for Evelina London Children's Hospital by walking 10km on his prosthetic legs. The figure quickly topped £1 million, with the final amount raised totalling £1.7 million.

South Thames Retrieval Service

South Thames Retrieval Service (STRS) is a children's acute transport service which specialises in the inter-hospital transfer of critically ill children in

(south of the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, se ...

). It operates from the children's intensive care unit of the Evelina London Children's Hospital. The unit is the lead centre for children's intensive care in the South Thames region and manages the clinical network for children's (paediatric) intensive care via the retrieval service, in conjunction with the intensive care units at

St George's Hospital St George's Hospital is a large teaching hospital in Tooting, London. Founded in 1733, it is one of the UK's largest teaching hospitals and one of the largest hospitals in Europe. It is run by the St George's University Hospitals NHS Foundatio ...

and King's College Hospital. With one phone call to the emergency number, a clinician in a South Thames hospital, can source clinical advice, a PICU bed and a transport team as necessary. STRS can then also coordinate specialist service input (e.g. cardiology).

References

External links