Lawrence’s foundation gifted $2 million
LOUISVILLE (March 17, 2017) — Norton Healthcare has announced plans to create a $78.3 million Jennifer Lawrence Foundation Cardiac Intensive Care Unit (CICU). Funds also will renovate the “Just for Kids” Critical Care Center and two of the neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) at Norton Children’s Hospital. The project should be completed by 2021. Lawrence is a native of Louisville.
Last year the Jennifer Lawrence Foundation gifted $2 million to help establish the unit.
More than 5,000 children a year visit the Norton Children’s Hospital Heart Center for specialized heart care, and the number of children needing specialized heart care continues to increase.
This project will allow Norton Children’s Hospital to strengthen services to the more than 1,400 critically ill and premature infants who come to the hospital each year for NICU services, as well as a growing number of patients who need specialized services at the Norton Children’s Heart Center and “Just for Kids” Critical Care Center.
Each year, the heart center performs more than 17,500 procedures that include open heart surgeries, catheter-based procedures, implanted cardiac devices and noninvasive tests such as echocardiograms.
The Jennifer Lawrence Foundation Cardiac Intensive Care Unit will feature 17 private rooms and space for families to stay with their children. It will be staffed by additional specialists with cardiac critical care training and experience, dedicated nursing staff and other professionals focused solely on heart care. Research has shown that units such as this can improve recovery.
Norton Children’s Hospital, working with specialists from University of Louisville Physicians and Pediatric Heart Care Partners, is home to the only heart center serving children and adults with congenital heart defects and children with acquired heart disease in Kentucky and Southern Indiana.
The heart center offers services to support the needs of children from before birth through adulthood. Adult congenital heart services, fetal cardiology, heart failure and transplant services are the only specialized heart programs in the state. These programs are led by a specialized team of cardiologists, electrophysiologists, interventional cardiologists, cardiovascular surgeons, intensive care physicians, cardiovascular anesthesiologists and support staff to address the needs of the entire family.
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