Children’s Hospital of Illinois (CHOI) at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center (SFMC) located in Peoria, Illinois, joined the Injury Free Coalition for Kids family in November 2003. CHOI is located in the heart of the heartland, positioned approximately halfway between St. Louis, Missouri and Chicago, Illinois. CHOI is the only Downstate Illinois tertiary care medical center devoted to children and serves a 35 county area representing over 500,000 children. In 2001, CHOI had over 6,300 inpatient admissions and 15,000 pediatric ED visits. CHOI serves as the Level I Trauma Center for Illinois Department of Public Health’s Trauma Region 2. Also unique to CHOI is its role as a reporting center for the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s (CPSC) National Electronic Injury Surveillance system (NEISS) since 1990. CHOI participates as an all injury program site, reporting all injuries treated in the ED. Together with three additional local hospitals that serve as CPSC NEISS reporting sites, injuries occurring in central Illinois are well documented.

CHOI is no stranger to injury prevention. A concentrated, collaborative effort in unintentional injury began in 1999 by bringing child passenger safety to the forefront in Peoria and the surrounding communities. Since a car seat check program began in Peoria, nearly 4400 car seats have been inspected and more than 500 seats have been provided to families in need. A car bed loaner program was instituted in 2001 to address infants being discharged from the hospital that weighed less than 5 pounds or with special needs that a conventional CSS could not accommodate. Since that time, the program has expanded to encompass other conditions that require children to travel in specialized restraints. CHOI was awarded with a grant from the Illinois Department of Transportation to institute a special needs resource center known as CRUISING kids.

Recognizing that education on proper child safety seat use needed to be widespread, CHOI extended its educational efforts to professionals by offering a variety of classes to improve their knowledge of safe transportation of children. A basic awareness class utilizing the Operation Kids Law Enforcement curriculum created by the International Association of Chiefs of Police and NHTSA is offered to community members. Taking education a step further by noting the need for more certified Child Passenger Safety Technicians, CHOI began to offer the NHTSA Standardized Child Passenger Safety Technician training in Peoria twice per year. Since 2000, we have successfully trained 82 professionals as Certified CPS Technicians. Children’s Hospital of Illinois also offers specialized training to CPS technicians to enhance their knowledge of transportation of children with special health care needs.

In Peoria, we pride ourselves on working as a team involving law enforcement, firefighters and medical professionals. As a team our outreach can be more comprehensive and effective than if we each attempted individually. We plan to expand our CPS efforts by targeting EMS first responders, especially in rural areas. They have an opportunity to improve the data collected at the scene of a crash if they document proper/improper Child Safety Seat (CSS) use and seating position in the crashed vehicle. They also have the unique opportunity to inform parents of the need to replace a CSS when it has been occupied in a crash.

Nationwide more than 70 percent of children ages 5 to 14 (2.7million) ride their bicycles, and more than 300,000 are treated in emergency departments for bicycle related injuries. Nearly half of these children are hospitalized with traumatic brain injury. Recognizing that the single most effective safety device available to reduce head injury and death from bicycle crashes is a helmet, Children’s Hospital of Illinois Advocacy Committee has provided bike helmets and bike safety education to local and regional children through the UnderCover program. The program enlists elementary schools to promote helmet use while riding bicycles. CHOI provides the helmets to all students in the selected schools during the first year of the program, and a neighborhood or regional organization is to provide bicycle helmets to children in kindergarten for the following two years. The school is encouraged to adopt a policy that no child will be allowed to ride a bicycle to school without wearing a helmet. Through evaluation of injury data collected in the Emergency Department, Injury Free Coalition for Kids of Peoria will identify a school with higher than average injuries to implement concentrated injury prevention efforts. These “Injury Free Schools” will focus upon injury prevention both in and out of the classroom, as well as after-school programs that focus on positive role models and mentoring programs.

Children living in rural environments are at an increased risk of injury and are often injured by different mechanisms than children in cities. In central Illinois, an increasing number of rural children are injured or even killed while riding All –Terrain Vehicles (ATV’s) for recreational use. Currently in Illinois, there are no regulations that control driver age or helmet usage by children while riding ATV’s. There is also very limited safety information and education available to riders. The Injury Free Coalition of Peoria plans to partner with interested stakeholders to begin an ATV safety education and awareness campaign.

Peoria Directors


Contact Info

Mapping address: 530 NE Glen Oak Avenue, Peoria, Illinois 61637



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John Hafner, MD

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Job Title:
Co-Principal Investigator

Biography:
Dr. Hafner is an Attending Physician in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the Children’s Hospital of Illinois and OSF Saint Francis Medical Center and an Assistant Clinical Professor of Surgery with the University of Illinois College of Medicine (UICOMP). In addition, Dr. Hafner is Director of Research for the Emergency Medicine Residency Program at UICOMP. He has a strong interest in pediatric injury prevention, conducting research and advocacy efforts on local all-terrain vehicle (ATV) injuries and currently pursuing an MPH with an emphasis on injury control. Dr. Hafner is a native of Albuquerque, NM and is a 1991 graduate of New Mexico State University with a Bachelor’s of Science Degree in Biology and a Bachelor’s of Arts Degree in Sociology. He completed his Medical Degree in 1996 at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. His residency training in Emergency Medicine was at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria, where he also served as the Chief Resident in Emergency Medicine in 1999.

He has resided in Peoria Illinois with his wife Michele since 1996. Together they have three children, Nicholas, Katie, and Jack.

Contact Information

Email Address:
jhafner@pol.net

Phone Number:
309-671-4825

Mailing Address:
OSF Saint Francis Medical Center
Emergency Dept.
530 NE Glen Oak
Peoria, IL 61637


Speaking Availability

Peoria is available to answer your group's questions via telephone or e-mail.

Richard Pearl, MD

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Job Title:
Co-Principal Investigator

Biography:
Richard H. Pearl, M.D. FACS, FAAP, FRCS(C)

Richard H. Pearl is Professor of Surgery and Pediatrics at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria. He is currently Director of Pediatric Trauma and Surgeon-in-Chief at the Children’s Hospital of Illinois and Director of the Pediatric Surgery Center.

Dr. Pearl is a 1975 graduate of Kent State University where he received his Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical Engineering. He went on to Wright State University, receiving his Medical Degree in 1980, and completed his Surgical Internship at Madigan Army Medical Center one year later. He completed his surgical residency at Harvard Surgical Service; New England Deaconess Hospital in Boston Massachusetts followed by Pediatric Surgery Residency at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada.

In conjunction with his medical training and service, Dr. Pearl is a retired Colonel in the U.S. Army, with a distinguished career spanning from 1966-1994. He served his country first as an infantry officer and helicopter pilot in Germany and Vietnam and then as a surgeon in Saudi Arabia and Iraq in Operation Desert Storm. From 1988-1994 he was Chief, Pediatric Surgical Service at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and has received numerous Military Honors and awards including the Bronze Star and Legion of Merit . From 1994-1998 Dr. Pearl was the Chief of Pediatric Surgery at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.

Dr. Pearl and his wife Lauretta made their home in Peoria in July 1998. He is the father of three daughters, with the youngest arriving in February 2000.

Contact Information

Email Address:
rhpearl@uic.edu

Phone Number:
309-671-4825

Mailing Address:
Pediatric Surgery Center
420 NE Glen Oak Suite 201
Peoria, IL 61603


Speaking Availability

Peoria is available to answer your group's questions via telephone or e-mail.

Jamie L. Sammis

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Job Title:
Program Coordinator

Biography:

Contact Information

Email Address:
jamie.l.sammis@osfhealthcare.org

Phone Number:
309-624-5906

Mailing Address:
530 NE Glen Oak Ave.
Peoria, IL. 61637


Margo Yoder, LPN

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Job Title:
Injury Surveillance Collection

Biography:
Margo is the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission/National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (CPSC/NEISS) representative at Children’s Hospital of Illinois at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria. Career at OSF SFMC has been: eighteen years in clinical nursing followed by the past eleven years doing ED coding & billing for the emergency department. Her experience in coding for the ED, led to collecting the data for CPSC/NEISS which collects injury data from 100 hospitals in the United States. She has been reporting injury related data to CPSC/NEISS for the past nine years. In June 2000, OSF SFMC was named to the “All Trauma Program” in their reporting to CPSC/NEISS for the expanded studies in areas of interest for the CDC. Margo is also the CPSC/NEISS representative at Hopedale Medical Complex in Hopedale, IL; a rural hospital 40 miles south of Peoria.

For the Injury Free Coalition for Kids in Peoria, she will be establishing a data base program to facilitate the data collected through ED chart surveillance; in the specific areas of focus (MVA, ATV, bikes, falls, and pedestrian related injuries). Central Illinois is fortunate to have 4 of the 100 CPSC/NEISS reporting hospitals in the area. Thus, our surveillance will be data from the 4 area hospitals.

Contact Information

Email Address:
margo.l.yoder@osfhealthcare.org

Phone Number:
309-671-4825

Mailing Address:
OSF Saint Francis Medical Center
Emergency Dept.
530 NE Glen Oak
Peoria, IL 61637


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