Florida Trend: A Healthy Alliance - Johns Hopkins & All Children's

By Amy Keller

In 2007, members of the board of All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg quietly began exploring a partnership with Johns Hopkins Medicine in Baltimore. Over its 86-year history, All Children’s had evolved from a small charity hospital for children with polio to become the only freestanding children’s hospital on Florida’s west coast. The hospital had won accolades, including being named by Child magazine as Florida’s best children’s hospital, but board members wanted to crack the rankings of the nation’s top five children’s hospitals.

Dr. Jonathan Ellen, then vice chair of Johns Hopkins’ Department of Pediatrics and head of the Department of Pediatrics and Neonatology at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, said discussions of an affiliation quickly turned into merger talks. “Johns Hopkins said to All Children’s, ‘We think this is a great opportunity, but you’re going to have to actually give us your assets,’ ” says Ellen. Continue reading…