Institute of Child Health, Kolkata

The Institute of Child Health (ICH) was set up by Dr K.C. Chaudhuri, the doyen of Indian pediatrics, in Kolkata in 1956. This is a trust run hospital on a no-profit ideal.

Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the then Prime Minister, inaugurated the institute on 16 January 1957. ICH continues to offer medical and surgical services to the ailing, and especially, the under- privileged children of the society.

ICH promotes pediatrics as a prime branch of study and investigation in medical teaching and practice in India. It embodies a medical vision: the optimal development of a healthy child into a healthy individual. Yes, it is taking care of ailing children “in every possible way.”

“What one receives from the society, one is morally obliged to return some of it back to the society” professed Professor Apurba Ghosh, Director of ICH, Kolkata. Some of these guiding principles have shaped the life and services of the professor, who has spent over four decades treating and curing children seamlessly of the deadliest of diseases with passion and compassion. Ever ready to help the poorest of the poor, the needy, the destitute, the abandoned kid, Dr Ghosh has made it his mission to provide the best possible care to an ailing child, irrespective of his/her background, at the lowest possible cost. This is an ethos he has inherited from his revered teachers and seniors at ICH and which he pursues with all seriousness and zeal. Fondly called “Dhanwantary” by the numerous parents and guardians who have a smile on their face today, Dr Ghosh has successfully treated many difficult and rare cases. He has special interest in dysmorphology and growth related disorders in children, endocrinological disorders, genetic conditions and rare diseases. Quite a number of rare diseases have been reported by him whose diagnosis would have been otherwise remain unrevealed, and in a way he has been a pioneer to diagnose and manage rare syndromes in the eastern part of India. The growth and dysmorphology was started by him years ago, at Institute of Child Health, Kolkata.Professor Ghosh loves academics to the core. An avid reader, and an early riser, Dr Ghosh had carved a disciplined and hard working life schedule, which is worth emulating for anyone who wishes to succeed. He has a special love for modern gadgets and is dynamic in the truest sense. Be it the practice of medicine, teaching or administration, he enthuses his dynamism and juggles effortlessly in the three arenas. A devoted teacher, who has proved that knowledge, is ageless and a doctor needs to update his knowledge time and again if he wishes to serve the society sincerely. He has been an eminent teacher for the past 40 years serving, now as professor and principal of the college. He has contributed immensely to the growth and expanse of the Institute, which he joined himself as a Junior Resident way back in 1979, after graduating with laurels from Guwahati Medical College, Assam. Over the last forty years, he moved ladder to ladder and assumed Directorship at a young age of 46. Under his command, the Institute made several achievements including addition of a nursing college in September 2020, to educate and train nurses, a pressing demand in the country today. A great visionary leader, who has driven the oldest pediatric hospital of India to become a tertiary care hospital of trust for millions and a center of learning for young doctors, nurses, and paramedical, is now on a war path to create a new modern hospital with advanced facilities for the coming generations of children and doctors alike.

The principal object of Institute of Child Health Trust, as defined by its core ideology and enshrined in Memorandum and Articles of Association of Institute of Child Health Trust, is to work towards child healthcare and advance medical education for the public benefit.

Our Mission:

Provide holistic care for overall health and best treatment to children in disease.

Provide medical consultancy in paediatric medicine and surgery to patients and counselling and guidance to children and young people.

Educate and train professionals in paediatric medicine and surgery through modern medicine. Also educate allied professionals, caretakers and people at large in child health.

Provide dissemination of new knowledge/ technical knowhow in the paediatric domain for advancement of medical science through active research, training, interactive academic exercises, and publications.

Work for the needy, downtrodden, abandoned and/or under-privileged children by providing medical services free of cost, and actively promoting fund raising for the cause of child development and care.

Our Vision

is a world where all children enjoy a healthy, disease-free and fruitful childhood and that medical professionals of the country can strive to achieve the vision through excellent education and training in paediatrics.

Our core belief is quality treatment and care of the child patient at nominal costs. We believe in the power of education to help individuals fulfill their potential and benefit society. In conducting our work, we seek to embody the following values :

Excellence in imparting treatment and care to our patients; and providing quality, up-to-date modern medical education to the budding pediatricians.

Integrity in the way we build trust and bring purpose to our work as an educational trust hospital.

Accountability through rigorous and transparent assessment of our performance.

Collaboration by working together across teams and in partnership with clients and customers to build capacity.

We seek to apply these values to all of our activities, to our interaction with our clients - our patients and, students, and to our relationship with our beneficiaries.

Public Benefit

Trustees have also given careful consideration to the general guidance on public benefit through healthcare and education and are satisfied that all the Trust’s work is for the public benefit. The Strategic Report sets out our activity in more detail.

New Building

Over the years, the 50 bedded hospital had to be expanded to 200 bedded to fulfill the need for the growing patients admission and treatment and MCI requirements of a post graduate teaching hospital. The main building being constructed 6- years before and now with encroachment of newer buildings around it have helped us to accommodate the various facilities but the scattered location of the related department at times does create a lack in smooth delivery of the management.The need for expansion of the various specialty department – PICU, Hemato-oncology, Nephrology along with diagnostics facility would require a new space The new building would accommodate all the different department in a much oriented manner which would facilitate and optimize the delivery of the healthcare management.The main building would have the outdoor facility of all the specialty, hostel accommodation of the doctors and nurses and the rest would be converted to a nursing college which would help our patients to get a better nursing care.

Advances in Diagnostics and Critical care management facility

With the awareness of healthcare development, through media and technology, the population at large seek for a diagnosis of each and every disease of their child. Overall, in the eastern sector, the diagnostic facility is quite less for the uncommon/rare disease which are no longer uncommon nor rare amongst the patients.

With the installation of all these diagnostic equipment, ICH would be able to provide diagnostic facility of most of the diseases, malignancies, genetic, endocrine, autoimmune etc at a relatively low cost.

Appeal

The institute over 60 years, has followed the pathway of dedication amongst all medical professionals who have supported the cause whole heartedly and treated all the poor patients with fullest care.

The donors over the years have also offered repeat donations after seeing the track record. We would request you to please help us in the expansion not only by the equipment provision but also helping us to build the new construction, without which it would be difficult to carry this noble effort another 60 years ahead.