Safra Children’s Hospital prepares pediatric patients for scary procedures in a fun way

Preparing children for scary, uncomfortable, or painful medical procedures is always part of the treatment plan at the Edmond and Lilly Safra Children’s Hospital of Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan.

Thanks to a first-in-Israel initiative spearheaded by Judy Bogen, the British émigré who founded and heads the nonprofit Place2Heal, Safra can better prepare pediatric patients for being inside a CT or an MRI machine.

While these machines produce high-quality medical images of tumors and organs to guide radiation therapy, among other disease treatments, they can be frightening for patients of any age. The machines make scary and banging noises, and kids are placed inside them all alone and instructed not to move.

“I experienced CT and MRI scans when I was already an adult and a mother,” says Bogen, a former breast cancer patient.

“I know how difficult the process is for a grown woman, and I’m sure that for children who are dealing with a complex medical condition, the uncertainty and threats of illness are even more difficult,” she says. “Sometimes kids are so frightened, they have to be anesthetized. The whole idea here is to give them a better understanding so that it won’t be as frightening.”

Bogen’s own medical experiences led her to research patient-centered care and evidence-based healthcare design, a concept that emphasizes the impact of the physical environment on patients’ emotional and physical well-being.

Devoted to “wellness by design,” Bogen’s Place2Heal nonprofit organization previously brightened up parts of the oncology day treatment center at Wolfson Medical Center in Holon. That first project was in 2020.

Simul Park, the new facility dedicated at Safra Children’s Hospital on September 6, “is groundbreaking in the field of pediatric imaging,” says Hagit Spiegel, the hospital’s administrator.

“Preparation for tests is an integral and significant part of the success of the scan, all the more so among pediatric patients who are afraid of what is expected of them,” Spiegel explains.

“For MRI and CT scans in particular, mental and physical preparation is especially necessary because their success depends on the patient’s cooperation,” she says. “The new room helps to relieve the stress that children and their parents are under, and it contributes to the mediation of medical procedures in a friendly and relaxing way.”

BOGEN WAS introduced to Spiegel by an acquaintance whose son was undergoing treatment at Safra.

Spiegel told Bogen that Safra’s Weizmann Educational Center, headed by Michal Raz, prepares young patients for common procedures such as IV placement and surgery.

However, when it came to CT and MRI simulation, “they’d talk to them about it but didn’t have a way to show them what it would be like,” says Bogen.

The three women immediately bonded over the idea of Place2Heal designing a more experiential form of preparation.

“Hagit was very excited about this. She has dreams and finds ways to make them come true,” Bogen says.

“We found a corner room of a really weird shape, and we worked with Michal and her amazing staff to transform it into a room where children and parents could go to learn about an MRI simulation using Alexa, a slide show, and an old MRI bed.”

In consultation with a graphic designer, they decided to set up the room like an amusement park that would appeal to both younger and adolescent patients.

“We’ve made it beautiful and fun,” Bogen says. “The educational staff at Safra created a comprehensive program, preparing children for the process they are about to undergo, and allowing them to experience it and to receive answers to all of their questions and doubts.”

Says Raz, “The goal of the educational team, working together with the medical teams, is to enable children to undergo scans with an understanding, a sense of control, and more cooperation with the professional teams.”

Simul Park was dedicated in memory of Jonny Baker, a British expat who died of cancer, whose friends from Bnei Akiva England raised half of the NIS 70,000 cost of the project through running a marathon. Family and friends of Baker were present at the ceremony, along with hospital administrators.

Bogen is now in the midst of Place2Heal projects at both campuses of Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center. She’s renovating the blood donation waiting room at Har Hazofim and the hematology waiting room at Ein Kerem. Her next project may be designing a family room in the pediatric oncology unit at Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba.

She said her experience working with Raz, Spiegel, and others at Safra was “unbelievable.”

“It is a great pleasure for us to know that together we will improve the quality of life of young children in Israel,” she says.

“Up until now, we have worked to renovate rooms and spaces for adult patients, and the switch to renovating and designing for children brings with it the promise of a better future.”