Children S Hospital

About 75 people crowded a meeting of the Southern New Jersey Health Systems Agency last night at the Holiday Inn in Runnemede, to discuss a plan to build a $76 million children's hospital adjacent to Cooper Hospital-University Medical Center. The hospital would serve 10 South Jersey counties. If the plan is approved, construction of the 175-bed hospital is set to begin in 1989, with completion planned for 1992. It would be built on Sixth Street, between Benson and Stevens Streets, at the rear of Cooper Hospital.

Though its contract expired at 7 a.m. yesterday, the union representing about 500 workers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has postponed its strike deadline until today at 1 p.m, according to a hospital spokeswoman. "If no agreement is reached by that time, they're threatening a strike," spokeswoman Karen Muldoon Geus said yesterday afternoon. "Right now there are ongoing discussions between both parties and everyone is working toward an agreement. " She said the negotiations yesterday were conducted by telephone.

Twelve students at Tamanend Middle School gave up three lunch periods last week to peddle paper daisies to merrily munching friends and classmates. The students, all seventh graders, were members of the school's Power of Positive Students club. They were collecting money for the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia for its 39th annual Daisy Day fund-raising campaign. Daisies went for a 25-cent donation. The daisies were an easy sell. The shouts in the lunchroom went something like this: "How much is it for one of those?"

The question of whether South Jersey needs its own children's hospital has sparked a dispute between two of the area's major health facilities, both of which are already providing highly specialized pediatric care. On one side is Cooper Hospital-University Medical Center in Camden, which has asked the New Jersey Legislature to designate it as South Jersey's first children's hospital. Cooper officials say the designation would give its pediatric service the public recognition it needs to continue to attract a high-caliber staff and more referrals from local pediatricians.

A fire broke out on the top floor of the west tower of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia yesterday afternoon but did not threaten patients. The west tower is under construction, and the top floors are unoccupied, a hospital spokeswoman said. A fire official said the blaze, which involved roofing materials and insulation, was quickly brought under control. Plumes of smoke could be seen over the West Philadelphia neighborhood. Jim Dimayo of Monmouth County said he was driving over the Walt Whitman Bridge, saw the smoke "and starting freaking out. I said, 'Oh my God, that's the hospital.

The mother of an 18-month-old girl being treated for cancer at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia climbed a seven-foot-high glass partition yesterday and leaped 50 feet to her death inside the hospital. Police said Maria M. Sabatini, 35, of Iven Avenue near Lancaster Pike in St. David's, Delaware County, was pronounced dead where she landed after leaping from the sixth floor inside the hospital's atrium about 8:30 a.m. Her fall was witnessed by some 25 employees who had gathered in the atrium for a disaster drill.

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia on Tuesday named a new general counsel to replace Roosevelt Hairston Jr., who was fired and is under investigation in the alleged theft of $1.7 million from the hospital. Jeffrey Kahn, who joined the hospital in 1994 as assistant general counsel, is taking over the office, said Steven M. Altschuler, chief executive officer. "The position of general counsel demands the highest standards of integrity and loyalty, and Jeff possesses both," Altschuler said in a news release.

Richard D. Wood Sr., 83, who left others to run the family business of Wawa Inc. while he helped lead the emergence of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia as a preeminent health-care institution, died yesterday at his home in Dunwoody Village, a Newtown Square retirement complex. Mr. Wood, a 70-year resident of Wawa, Delaware County, was born into a family whose success in business was long established. His grandfather had founded Wawa Dairy Farms in 1902, and the family textile business, Millville Manufacturing Co., was incorporated in 1865.

  Had they been born a quarter-century ago, the 200 children would have been lucky to survive. These days, the issues they face at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia seem mundane by comparison. Can the children babble a few words? Put wooden pegs in holes? Kick a ball? The 200 infants and toddlers are veterans of major heart surgery, and to the untrained eye they seem no different from any other kid, but for a faint scar on the chest. Yet increasingly, researchers at Children's Hospital and elsewhere are finding that such patients are more likely to experience subtle developmental delays.

David Cornfeld, 66, deputy physician-in-chief at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, died Monday while on a trip to Santiago, Chile. Dr. Cornfeld had been associated with Children's Hospital for more than 30 years. He was a professor and vice chairman of the department of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, where he had been on faculty since 1957. He was the hospital's first chief of the general pediatric division, which received national recognition for its program to educate future leaders in pediatrics.

Many years ago, specialists at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia recognized an obstacle in diagnosing and treating fetal abnormalities and babies born with life-threatening defects.The babies had to be delivered at adult hospitals, then transferred to Children's Hospital. This added medical and logistical challenges for hospitals and the families. Now, the hospital is celebrating a milestone in its solution to the problem: the 1,000th baby was recently born in its Special Delivery Unit.

The death of yet another apparently malnourished child who ultimately succumbed to abuse has Philadelphians once again asking how these tragedies can be avoided. For all the improvements made within the city's Department of Human Resources since 14-year-old Danieal Kelly starved to death six years ago, there are still children who end up dead. The latest is Khalil Wimes, 6, who died last week of blunt-force trauma to the head. He weighed only 29 pounds. Medical examiners said he had suffered tremendously before being taken, unconscious, sunken, and sallow, to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

When doctors at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia laid their eyes on Khalil Wimes on Monday night, they saw a broken and emaciated little boy. He was unconscious, sunken, and sallow, 6 years old but weighing only 29 pounds. His mother, Tina Cuffie, 44, had five other children who were removed from her care. She had taken her son to the hospital, saying he had slipped in the bathroom. She could not explain the sea of scarring along the boy's arms, face, back, and neck. Khalil died within the hour of blunt-force trauma to the head, a medical examiner ruled.

Years ago, when children tore an anterior cruciate ligament, the conventional wisdom was to delay surgery until their bones were nearly finished growing. That's because the surgery to repair the ligament, found in the knee, carried a slight risk of what doctors call a "growth disturbance. " Among other possible issues, that meant one leg could end up shorter than the other. A new study from Children's Hospital of Philadelphia suggests it is better to go ahead with surgery after all, because a delay may lead to other types of injury.

  Had they been born a quarter-century ago, the 200 children would have been lucky to survive. These days, the issues they face at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia seem mundane by comparison. Can the children babble a few words? Put wooden pegs in holes? Kick a ball? The 200 infants and toddlers are veterans of major heart surgery, and to the untrained eye they seem no different from any other kid, but for a faint scar on the chest. Yet increasingly, researchers at Children's Hospital and elsewhere are finding that such patients are more likely to experience subtle developmental delays.

A 17-year-old girl was hospitalized Friday after being shocked in the forehead by a group of girls armed with a stun gun in the city's Overbrook section, police said. The attack occurred around 11:50 a.m. near 59th Street and Lansdowne Avenue, said Officer Tanya Little. A group of eight girls from a nearby school confronted the victim, and one of them used the stun gun. The girl was reported in stable condition at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Little said. No arrests were reported.

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia apologized Wednesday for the way it had communicated with the parents of Amelia Rivera, the 3-year-old disabled girl whose quest for a kidney transplant has garnered national attention. In a statement released with the approval of the Riveras, the hospital said it was reviewing its processes to ensure that it was "sensitive to the needs of all families. " In January, Joe and Chrissy Rivera said that a hospital physician had told them the girl should not have a transplant because of her mental disability.

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia apologized Wednesday for the way it had communicated with the parents of Amelia Rivera, the 3-year-old disabled girl whose parents want her to have a kidney transplant. In a statement released with the approval of the Riveras, the hospital expressed regret for how it had handled the situation. Joe and Chrissy Rivera gained national attention in January when they said a hospital physician had recommended against such a transplant because of her mental disability.

Sunday Civil War discoveries The Camden County Historical Society will host James E. Johnson for a program 2 p.m. Sunday on "Discovering Black Civil War Veterans and their Widows in 1890 Camden. " Johnson, a specialist in African American history and the Civil War and an adjunct lecturer at Rutgers University-Camden, will talk about a special census of about 60 Civil War veterans and their widows that was taken along with the general census of 1890. Its purpose was to shape veterans' pension legislation and help Civil War veterans locate comrades as witnesses for pension claims.