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Children’s Hospital Research Saves and Improves Children’s Lives Did you know that a physician at a children’s hospital was the first to identify AIDS in children and that the polio vaccine was first tested at a children’s hospital? Pediatric research is an essential part of a children’s hospital’s mission. The National Association of Children’s Hospitals and Related Institutions (NACHRI) supports research conducted by children’s hospitals across the country by increasing public awareness of the benefits that pediatric research offers to all children. One-third of children’s hospitals operate child health research centers that have advanced lifesaving discoveries such as vaccines, gene therapies and specialized surgical techniques. Virtually all children’s hospitals participate in lifesaving clinical trials, and 70 percent perform basic science and health services research. Children’s hospitals have also made important advances in fetal surgery, bone marrow transplants and the treatment of birth defects and heart conditions. That’s why NACHRI encourages continued federal funding for pediatric research in children’s hospitals. But research into pediatric illnesses and conditions doesn’t just help children. Children’s hospital research has resulted in prevention and treatment discoveries for high-cost adult diseases that begin in childhood, such as osteoporosis, diabetes and obesity. Children’s hospitals are also working together to test, study and increase the number and variety of drugs that are approved for use in children. Without these studies, children are vulnerable to improper drug dosages and may miss out on new and more effective cutting-edge therapies that are being developed. Pediatric research enables children’s hospitals to better serve all children with the latest discoveries and treatments taken out of the laboratory and provided directly to the young patients they serve. For more information on what research the children’s hospital community is working on now, visit the NACHRI Web site at www.childrenshospitals.net.