The Department of Pediatrics was among the first few departments to be established at AIIMS. The children’s inpatient services were inaugurated by the late Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in January 1960. During the last five decades, we have grown into a multi-specialty academic institution providing leadership in healthcare, health professional education, multi-faceted research and child health policy.
The Vision of the Department is to be one of the ten best academic centres of Pediatrics in the world before 2020. Our Mission is to improve the health of children through world-class excellence in education, patient care, research, innovation and policy assistance. Our core values are accountability, enabling mentorship, child friendliness, partnering, team spirit , good governance and fraternal ethos.
The Department has been nurtured by some of the most pre-eminent faculty, and enriched by brilliant students and scholars. Today, the Department has well developed specialties of Neonatology, Genetics, Nephrology, Neurology, Endocrinology, Oncology, Infectious Diseases, Rheumatology, Pulmonology, and Gastroenterology & Hepatology.
The Department has been rated as the best department in the country by the popular magazine, The Week, for four consecutive years since 2007. In 2012, the Department bagged the CNBC TV 18 national award for the best specialty hospital in Pediatrics in the country.
We are credited with development of a vaccine (Rotavirus), two new diagnostics (Cystic Fibrosis, Celiac Disease) improved drugs (neonatal Surfactant, low osmolality ORS). We hold multiple patents and are among the leading departments in the Institute in extramural funded research.
The Department contributes scores of books and monographs and publishes over 100 papers each year . The Department has excelled in developing innovative educational programmes for the doctors and nurses, including an online educational program on newborn care already accessed by 3000 health professionals/ trainees in nine countries and apps on smart phones , total downloads of 8000 in eighty countries.
There are 45 general pediatric beds, 8-bedded High Dependency Unit, 8-bedded Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, 22 bedded Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, 8-bedded Kangaroo Mother Care Unit, and 24 rooming-in newborn beds. The Department also has a 12-bedded Day Care Unit, and 3-bedded Hemodialysis Unit. The Department runs ambulatory general pediatric OPD services every day, and more than 10 specialty clinics in the afternoons.
During 2012-13, as many as the Department provided outpatient consultation to as many as 1,16,648 children and provided inpatient care to 2,250 children, 10,611 day care and 2439 neonates. The Department is supported by 14 faculty members, 4 scientists, 17 DM residents, 29 Senior residents, 30 Junior residents, 18 Ph.D. scholars and over 150 member complement of research staff.
Special Status
The Department of Pediatrics has made an outstanding contribution to national and global child health policy and programs. The Department hosts:
Our vision is to be one of the ten best academic centres of Pediatrics in the world before 2020
Our mission is to improve the health of children through world-class excellence in:
We are committed to:
