How long has the PASS service been provided at Children’s Hospital?

 In 2003, Dr. J. Michael Connors, seeing the tremendous need for sedation around the hospital, envisioned the development of a pediatric sedation service at Children’s Hospital.  After research and visits to other sedation services and discussions with Anesthesiology and the hospital Administration, the sedation service was started in January 2004.  The vision was to offer greater safety and comfort to patients for medical procedures and tests while at Children’s Hospital. 

Similar to other sedation services around the country, PASS utilizes fellowship trained and board certified pediatric emergency physicians to provide the service.  Pediatric emergency physicians have significant training in sedation and routinely provide this service to sick and injured patients in the Emergency Department.  PASS allows these physicians to extend this service to other areas of the hospital.  The PASS sedation specialists have performed more than 3,500 sedation procedures since the beginning of the service and currently provide more than 90 percent of the sedation that occurs outside of the operating room at Children’s Hospital. 

Dr. Connors, President of PASS, continues to visit sedation services in other areas of the country, attend national conferences on pediatric sedation and research protocols to ensure the service at Children’s Hospital performs sedation in the best manner for our patients.  After attending a conference in Denver on the subject, Dr. Connors noted, “We were delighted to see that our service at Children’s Hospital is more advanced than most other pediatric sedation services around the country.” 

PASS continues to seek to improve and provide the best sedation service in the country.  PASS has joined the Pediatric Sedation Research Consortium (PSRC), a national network of hospitals that share and analyze date related to sedation children.  The purpose of the consortium is to allow all sedation providers across the country to improve their practice and increase safety  for children receiving sedation. PASS reports each sedation case to the consortium, but data contains no personal identifiers.

When is the PASS service available to my child, and who are the physicians involved? 
The service is available Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. until 4 p.m. for patients undergoing scheduled tests in the Radiology Department (especially CT and MRI scans that require children to remain still for extended periods of time), as well as for patients in the Hematology/Oncology Outpatient Clinic, the Neurology Laboratory and the Gastroenterology Laboratory.  The service also is available for procedures for admitted patients and continues to grow to other areas of the hospital. If you are a healthcare provider who would like to schedule a patient ore learn more please click here.

 Physicians who are members of PASS are J. Michael Connors, M.D.; Robert Dickson, M.D.; Ryan Redman MD; and John Williams, M.D.

Which areas of Children’s Hospital utilize the PASS on Pain services?

The Radiology Department utilizes the PASS service for areas including MRI, nuclear medicine testing, renal biopsy as well as some other tests.  The Hematology/ Oncology Department uses the PASS service for procedures such as bone marrow testing, spinal taps and others.  Dr. Cory Strobel uses the PASS service within the Gastroenterology Laboratory and the Emergency Department often utilize the service.  PASS also provides services for the Neurology Laboratory and Cardiology and continues to expand.  Any area of the hospital may use the service for the comfort of a patient, depending on the medical procedure or situation.  If you feel your patient or child can benefit from PASS, please feel free to discuss this with your child’s physician.