Frequently, children with serious or long-term illnesses also have breathing-related needs. Typically, they need ventilator machines to help them breathe, sometimes for months or years. However, these children often become medically stable enough to be safely cared for at home on their ventilators.
Many pulmonary habilitation program patients come from neonatal or pediatric intensive care units throughout the Midwest. Children are eligible for our program if they are medically stable for home care, family members want to take the child home and are willing to learn home care, and the child has housing that can accommodate the ventilator.
Mission
Our program seeks to provide high-quality, family-centered care for all children who require tracheostomy and chronic invasive ventilation with the primary goals of achieving medical stability including transition from hospital to home ventilator, providing excellent caregiver training, and coordinating safe discharge home.
Vision
Our program will improve the care for children who require chronic invasive ventilation through innovation and collaboration in clinical care, research, education, and advocacy.
Why Choose Lurie Children's
Our program is the largest of its kind in Illinois and one of the largest in the nation. The goal of the program is to return children to their homes and keep them as active as possible in family, school and community activities. Families are provided with some home nursing support in order to help them with their child’s care.
Our staff members are experts in mechanical ventilation, understanding technical issues, coordinating the complex process for going home and understanding the needs of families. Our program currently coordinates the care of more than 200 children at home on ventilator support. We manage ventilator care for some of the most complex cases in the greater Chicago metropolitan area.
PHP Team Members
Alexandra Feldman, MD
Dr. Feldman was born and raised in Houston, TX and joined Lurie Children's in 2022 as faculty in the Department of Pediatrics and Division of Critical Care Medicine. She is the current Medical Director of the Pulmonary Habilitation Program and works as an attending in the pediatric intensive care unit. Her clinical and research interests include mechanical ventilation especially chronic ventilation and improving care for children with medical complexity.
Denise M. Goodman, MD, MS
Denise Goodman is a Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Board-Certified General and Critical Care Pediatrician. She completed medical school at State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine, pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Cincinnati and her pediatric pulmonology fellowship at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. Her clinical focus and expertise are in pediatric acute respiratory failure and advanced life support.
Steven Lestrud, MD
Steven Lestrud is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Board-Certified Pediatric Pulmonologist with the Division of Critical Care and Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine. He completed medical school at University of Tennessee School of Medicine, pediatric residency at the Medical University of South Carolina, and his pediatric pulmonology fellowship at Children’s Memorial Hospital. His clinical focus and expertise are in pediatric pulmonary hypertension and in taking care of children requiring chronic home invasive mechanical ventilation.
Avani V. Shah, MD
Avani Shah is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Board-Certified Pediatric Pulmonologist with the Division of Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine since 2018. She completed medical school at Drexel University College of Medicine, pediatric residency at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and her pediatric pulmonology fellowship at Lurie Children's. Her clinical focus and expertise are in pediatric severe asthma and in taking care of children requiring chronic home invasive mechanical ventilation.
Lindsey Hird-McCorry, BSN, RN, CPN
Lindsey Hird-McCorry is a Nurse Coordinator with the Pulmonary Habilitation Program at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago with 25 years of experience caring for pediatric patients requiring chronic invasive mechanical ventilation and their families. She received the Nurse Exemplar Award, Family Educator in 2013 and Prince Nurse Scholar Grant in 2018.
Caroline Hodgson, DNP, APRN, CPNP-AC
Caroline (Cari) Hodgson joined Ann & Robert H Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago in 2018 as part of the Pulmonary Habilitation Program team. She is board certified as an Acute Care and Primary Care Pediatric Nurse Practitioner. She earned her Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) from Indiana University. Cari’s clinical focus is on health care delivery to children with medical complexity, especially those requiring chronic home invasive mechanical ventilation.
Angela Janus, BSN, RN, CPN
Angela Janus is a Nurse Coordinator with the Pulmonary Habilitation Program at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. She is passionate about medically complex patient populations and enjoys caring for chronically vented patients and their families.
Philip Swanson, RT
Philip Swanson is a Respiratory Therapist with the Pulmonary Habilitation Program at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago.
Make an Appointment
To contact the program’s specialists, call 312.227.6867.