Boston Children’s, Cleveland Clinic team up to provide pediatric heart care

Boston Children’s Hospital and the Cleveland Clinic have teamed up to provide comprehensive pediatric heart services to patients on the Cleveland Clinic’s national network, a collection of cardiovascular care providers that contract services with employers and other payers.

Through the collaboration, Boston Children’s has become part of the network and plans to help expand the services offered through it, according to a July 26 press release. In the future, they hope to provide complex and rare pediatric care that patients will travel for.

Boston Children’s is one of the largest pediatric heart centers in the world. Over the last five years, it has performed more than 6,800 cardiac surgeries.

“Teamwork in many forms is the next phase of American medicine,” said Hani Najm, MD, the chair of Pediatric and Congenital Heart Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic, in a statement. “We’re finding new ways to combine our individual strengths for better patient care and higher value.”

In the agreement, Boston Children’s will receive special status in the Cleveland Clinic’s network, serving as a leader and sharing their best practices.

“Together, our goal to develop and provide consistently high-quality outcomes will drive ongoing improvement and spur innovations for the benefit of patients and families,” said Pedro J. del Nido, MD, chief of cardiac surgery at Boston Children’s, in a statement. “The collaboration between our organizations offers access to high quality, cost effective care to employers’ families who need the most complex heart care.”