St. Louis Children's Hospital was established in 1879 as a 15-bed facility in a small private home in downtown St. Louis. With the addition of a 20-bed neurorehabilitation and orthopaedic unit in 1994, Children's is now a 255-bed institution offering a full range of pediatric services to children from the St. Louis metropolitan area, much of Missouri, southern Illinois and beyond. The immediate service area has a population of 2.5 million.

Today, St. Louis Children's Hospital and Washington University Medical Center provide modern medical and surgical facilities, clinical and research laboratories and medical libraries, all within four city blocks.

St. Louis Children's Hospital facilities include an emergency department, a 26-bed pediatric intensive care unit, a 52-bed neonatal intensive care unit, a five-bed bone marrow transplant unit, six general care units and numerous ambulatory activities. A typical year at St. Louis Children's Hospital includes approximately 14,000 admissions, 61,000 emergency room visits and 185,000 ambulatory visits. Through the COPE program, pediatric residents see approximately 12,000 patients.

Under the leadership of Lee F. Fetter, president, and Alan L. Schwartz, pediatric chairman, St. Louis Children's Hospital is ranked one of the leading pediatric hospitals in the nation.