Christina Echegaray

Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt broke ground Oct. 29 on a new 37,500-square-foot facility that will significantly expand pediatric specialty care, outpatient surgery and imaging services to children in Rutherford and surrounding counties.

Each October, as Missy Cook helps unload trailers full of bright, plump pumpkins with hundreds of volunteers, she’s reminded why the Cooper Trooper Foundation Pumpkin Patch exists — because her son, Cooper, 10, is alive after surviving a rare cancer that was found when he was just 8 weeks old.

Nashville Predators goaltender Pekka Rinne, Predators executives and executives from Tri Star Energy (Twice Daily) made their annual presentation recently of proceeds from the team’s 365 Pediatric Cancer Fund to Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt.

Lily Hensiek, diagnosed with pre B cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia 10 years ago at age 7, has helped raise $1 million, through community fundraisers and individual donors, to create two funds to support pediatric cancer research and training at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. The funds are the Lily’s Garden Endowed Lecture in Childhood Cancer and the Lily’s Garden Research Fund.

Steven Webber, MBChB, MRCP, chair of the Department of Pediatrics, delivered the annual State of the Department address Sept. 4, celebrating the people that form the department while reviewing major achievements in the past year and discussing the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead.

John Thomas, MD, associate professor of Pediatric Urology, has two new roles at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. Thomas has assumed a newly created role as clinical director for the OR at Children’s Hospital and is an associate chief of staff.