Starship Children's Hospital is a public

children's hospital A children's hospital (CH) is a hospital that offers its services exclusively to infants, children, adolescents, and young adults from birth up to until age 18, and through age 21 and older in the United States. In certain special cases, the ...

Auckland Auckland ( ; ) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. It has an urban population of about It is located in the greater Auckland Region, the area governed by Auckland Council, which includes outlying rural areas and ...

, New Zealand. Opened on 18 November 1991, it was one of the first purpose-built children's hospitals in

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

, and is the largest such facility in the country. Although a separate facility, it is located on the same grounds as the Auckland City Hospital in Grafton,

, and is adjacent to the Auckland Medical School. On 1 July 2022 Te Whatu Ora – Health New Zealand and Te Aka Whai Ora – Māori Health Authority became New Zealand's new national health authorities and Starship became part of Health New Zealand. There are more than 140,000 patient visits to Starship Child Health each year including around 1000 outreach clinics where Starship clinicians offer specialist consultation and support to their peers all around New Zealand.

Facilities

Design

The main Starship building opened on 18 November 1991 on the grounds of Auckland City Hospital. Its name was chosen to appeal to children and young people and to reflect the building's design. The building has a central atrium lit by natural light and designed to a rainforest theme with a playground. Each of its five levels is painted a different colour, with a symbolic meaning: aqua for the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

; orange for land;

blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...

for sky;

yellow Yellow is the color between green and orange on the spectrum of light. It is evoked by light with a dominant wavelength of roughly 575585 nm. It is a primary color in subtractive color systems, used in painting or color printing. In t ...

for sunshine; and

pink Pink is a pale tint of red, the color of the Dianthus plumarius, pink flower. It was first used as a color name in the late 17th century. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, pink is the color most often associated with charm, p ...

for health. The building was designed by Stephenson & Turner architects to fit on a small sloping site. Having rooms curve around the atrium avoids long institutional corridors and reduces walking distance for staff and patients.

Medical

Facilities include inpatient and outpatient services as well as community-based services such as Community Child Health and Disability Service, Safekids and Paediatric Home Care. The building has nine wards and a capacity of 219 beds. Besides the main building, Starship has outpatient clinics for the Auckland region in Tamaki, West Auckland and North Shore, as well as being associated with approximately 45 Outreach Clinics throughout the country. Starship Hospital is the

major trauma centre A major trauma centre (MTC) is a specialist unit within the National Health Service of the United Kingdom, set up to provide specialised trauma care and rehabilitation. They are usually found within larger hospitals in major cities which have ...

for children in the Auckland region, and the tertiary major trauma centre for children in the Northland, Auckland, and northern parts of the Waikato region. The Green Lane Paediatric and Congenital Cardiac Service, based at Starship Hospital, provides national treatment for paediatric and adult congenital heart problems.

Others

The volunteer group

Radio Lollipop Radio Lollipop is a charitable organization providing a care, comfort, play and entertainment service for children in hospital. It organizes Volunteer Playmakers to spend time with children in wards or in special play areas, taking its name fro ...

operate a hospital radio station, as well as visiting children with games and entertainment in the evenings. The hospital includes a number of food outlets and a convenience store.

References

External links

Welcome to Starship Children's Health and Starship Foundation
(official hospital website) {{Authority control Grafton, New Zealand Hospital buildings completed in 1991 Children's hospitals in New Zealand Teaching hospitals in New Zealand Buildings and structures in Auckland Hospitals established in 1991 1991 establishments in New Zealand 1990s architecture in New Zealand