At Ranken Jordan, we are so proud of how our team continues to innovate to move pediatric hospital care forward, and 2025 was truly one for the record books. We launched seven new initiatives, many of them the first of their kind in our state and one of only a few in the country.
Our unique care model, Care Beyond the Bedside, is at the heart of everything we do and it’s our goal to drive innovative work at our hospital and share successes with the wider medical community, demonstrating what’s possible when we reimagine pediatric hospital care.
2025 was an incredible year of innovation for our team. Here’s what we accomplished:
1. Opened Two Classrooms for Our OZ Program
We kicked off the year with the formal opening of two new OZ classrooms. While classrooms for preschool-age children is not the norm in a hospital, this permanent home for OZ was a priority, as the program has become a key element of care plans for patients 0-5.
OZ offers hospitalized, medically complex children age 5 and younger the opportunity to have structured play and developmental stimulation. These are two critical factors to help reduce the adverse developmental impacts accompanying long-term hospitalization.
Our youngest patients are loving the bright and welcoming new classrooms. It’s a joy to walk past when classes are in session to witness all the smiles, singing and laughter first-hand.
2. Launched A Private Duty Nursing Discovery Model
This year, we also announced a project that’s been in the works for a while: our Private Duty Nursing (PDN) Discovery Model.
There is a nationwide shortage of PDN care, something that is needed by many families to safely care for their medically complex child at home. Over the course of a year, there are typically 10-15 patients hospitalized at Ranken Jordan who would likely succeed at home if the family had access to sufficient PDN coverage.
To find solutions to this problem, we launched the PDN Discovery Model, led by our Director of Nursing, Amanda Boeckstiegel. Amanda and her team created an initiative to upskill Ranken Jordan nurses so they could serve in PDN roles to fill the gaps caused by the shortage. The program has allowed multiple Ranken Jordan patients to get home faster.
Amanda won the prestigious Nurse Innovator Award, presented by the The Center for Missouri Nurses, for her work on the project.
3. Helped Families Prepare at Sim Home
Most recently, we launched our new simulated home environment, aka Sim Home, a homelike space in our hospital for caregivers to “practice” being at home with their medically complex child.
Our goal with all of our patients is for them to get home safely because children thrive when they’re with the people they love. But going home can be daunting for parents and caregivers, especially for children with life-saving medical equipment like trachs and ventilators.
Sim Home gives caregivers the chance to stay overnight at Ranken Jordan to practice the skills they learned through our caregiver training, knowing that a nurse is nearby in case of emergency or questions.
It’s only been open for a few months but we’re hearing from parents that the one night has made them more confident and made the transition home smoother than anticipated.
4. Introduced a Summer Camp Program for Kids with Medical Complexity
Summer Camp is a rite of passage kids with medically complex conditions often miss out on. That did not sit well with our therapy team, so this summer they inaugurated Ranken Jordan’s Adventure ReimagineED day camp.
To the best of our knowledge, this is the only in-hospital camp in our region that invites children with complex medical issues AND their siblings.
From June 30-July 3, 2025, our therapists hosted 55 kids over a series of 10 mini camps focused on a variety of activities like dance, golf, gardening, and even baking. These camps were not all fun and games (although there were a lot of both). We know that when kids get together, they reach their therapy goals faster.
5. Appointed Our First-Ever Chief Health Transformation Officer
Sharing our unique model, Care Beyond the Bedside, is a key priority of our strategic plan. With this model, we work to lower the risk of neurodevelopmental delay while promoting psychological well-being and family connection.
The number of children with complex medical needs continues to grow nationwide. While we do serve children from across the Midwest, we cannot serve everyone. We created the role of Chief Health Transformation Officer to drive systemic change in pediatric hospital care beyond our walls.
We appointed our longtime Chief Medical Officer, Nick Holekamp, MD, to the new position. Nick is a sought after expert in the pediatric complex care field and the greatest champion of Care Beyond the Bedside.
6. Launched Ranken Jordan’s Research Department
While scientific research is a given at academic health systems, it is not expected at an independent specialty hospital like ours. Because Ranken Jordan is committed to sharing our unique Care Beyond the Bedside model with the wider community, we knew we needed to prove our model as objectively as possible.
In 2021, we created the Ranken Jordan Research Group. This group designed and implemented a multiyear time-motion study at Ranken Jordan, which was subsequently published in 2023 in the peer-reviewed journal, Child: Care, Health and Development.
We hired a full-time research director at the end of 2024 and formally launched Ranken Jordan’s Research Department in 2025. This is a major step in advancing our mission beyond the walls of Ranken Jordan.
7. Published Our Second Peer-Reviewed Paper
Finally, we published our second paper in a peer-reviewed journal, with “Care Beyond the Bedside: Creating Space for Families of Hospitalized Children with Medical Complexity” in Children. This publication was a major milestone as it was our first since the inception of our new Research Department.
This published review paper outlines the negative effects of prolonged hospitalization for children with complex medical needs, and how Care Beyond the Bedside is specifically designed to diminish those effects.
Be a Part of Driving Innovation
Many of these incredible initiatives would not have been possible without donor support. If you’re interested in giving to our work and future initiatives, visit RankenJordanFoundation.org to donate.
