Pediatric Palliative Care

In 2011, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta introduced pediatric palliative care services to help improve the quality of life for children with serious and life-threatening conditions, including genetic disorders, cancer, neurological disorders, and heart and lung conditions.

Our Pediatric Advanced Care Team (PACT), which includes specially trained pediatric palliative care doctors, nurses, social workers and others, helps patients and their families deal with care at every stage of a serious illness.  And because every child and family is different, we personalize care for each, tailoring our services to meet your specific needs.

Our pediatric palliative care service works with children, their families and their care teams throughout each child’s illness and treatment. Our palliative care specialists are trained to listen, assess, and find innovative ways to make life as comfortable as possible for each child. We collaborate with other pediatric medical specialists across a variety of clinical services, as well as our child life specialists and chaplains to provide holistic, interdisciplinary care.

Pediatric palliative care aims to:

• Help children and families identify, prevent and manage stress and symptoms across every stage of disease, including:
  • Pain
  • Shortness of breath
  • Fatigue
  • Constipation
  • Nausea
  • Loss of appetize
  • Difficulty sleeping
  • Anxiety
  • Depression
• Improve the quality of life for children, despite the effects of their diseases.
• Explore the hopes of our children and their families in order to set realistic goals for care.
• Partner with community programs and identify resources for children and families.
• Provide continuity of care and help facilitate the transition to home.
• Offer psychosocial support services for children and families.
• Work closely with our children, their families and the medical teams that care for them.

The Children’s team plays a key role in the development of the field of pediatric palliative care. We are active in advancing research, as well as providing community outreach, educational assistance and oversight of public policy. Our outreach activities include: 

• Hosting a Pediatric Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellowship Program.
• Establishing appropriate palliative-centered policies.
• Facilitating national and regional pediatric palliative care advocacy efforts.
• Expanding our knowledge through collaborative research.
• Sharing expertise with outside providers to make a difference for children throughout the Southeast
• Positioning Children’s as a leading voice nationally on how pediatric healthcare providers identify and treat suffering.

Children's is able to help provide the most up-to-date care for our patients and develop new programs like PACT due to the generous support of our donors. To support PACT, contact Katie Miller, Senior Development Officer.

Our palliative care team includes specially trained staff that is comfortable working with children who have been diagnosed with serious and life-threatening illnesses. They are dedicated to putting your child and family first.

Physicians

• Khaliah Johnson, MD, Division Chief
• Cia Bishop, MD
• Katharine Brock, MD, MS
• Johnathan Ebelhar, MD
• Emilee Flynn, MD, MPH, Fellowship Director
• Taylor Huntington, MD
• Andrew McReynolds, MD, MPH
• Nitya Shah, MD
• Kelsey Largen, PhD

Advanced practice providers

• Kayla Combs, CPNP
  
• Anna Lange, CPNP
• Sarah Riebel, CPNP
• Meghan Tracewski, MSN, RN, CPNP

Psychosocial Team

• Heather Cohen, MA
• Mary Grace Davenport, MSW, LCSW
• Kelsey Largen, PhD
• Allison Pellettieri, MSW, LCSW
• Maura Savage, MSW, LCSW

Bereavement coordinator

• Heather Cohen, MA

Arthur M. Blank Hospital
2220 North Druid Hills Road, NE
Atlanta, GA 30329

Scottish Rite Hospital
1001 Johnson Ferry Road, NE
Atlanta, GA 30342