Fetal and Maternal Health Leader Named Co-Director of Pregnancy and Newborn Services

For Release: November 2, 2015

STANFORD, Calif. —Susan R. Hintz, MD, MS, has been appointed as co-director of the Johnson Center for Pregnancy and Newborn Services at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and Stanford Medicine Children's Health. More than 4500 babies are delivered each year at the Johnson Center, which offers the highest level of care for both routine and complex cases.

Hintz is the medical director for the hospital’s Fetal and Pregnancy Health Program, which she helped establish in 2009. She is also Robert L. Hess Family professor of neonatal and developmental medicine, professor of pediatrics and obstetrics and gynecology at the Stanford University School of Medicine and associate chief for prenatal services in the division of neonatal and developmental medicine at Stanford.

A neonatologist and perinatal epidemiologist, Hintz joins the Johnson Center leadership team that includes Yasser El-Sayed, MD, co-director of the Johnson Center and obstetrician-in-chief at Packard Children’s, and David K. Stevenson, MD, director of the Johnson Center and senior associate dean for maternal and child health at Stanford.

“Our mission in the Johnson Center is to provide comprehensive, world-class care to expectant mothers, infants and families,” said Hintz, noting that the hospital is the only children’s hospital in the Bay Area—and one of the few in the country—to offer obstetric, neonatal and developmental medicine services all in one place. “As co-director, I will continue to work with the team to grow and expand our services, which includes broadening our geographic reach, and to provide our patients with the leading-edge and innovative treatments that we are known for at Packard Children’s.”

Hintz has been at Stanford throughout her training and career. “I feel truly privileged to be a part of Stanford University and Stanford Children’s Health,” she said. “I work with teams and individuals who share my passion for providing extraordinary care, pursuing innovative research and improving outcomes.”

The Johnson Center, launched in 1997, brings together multiple specialists in obstetrics, neonatology, perinatal genetics, developmental pediatrics, reproductive and fertility services, and perinatal biology. In addition, the Johnson Center has a robust network of perinatal diagnostic centers and neonatal intensive care units that draw on Stanford Medicine Children's Health collaborations and partnerships throughout Northern California.

”We work very closely with medical and surgical subspecialists throughout Stanford Children’s Health,” Hintz said. “This ensures a streamlined continuum of care for complex patients and their families.”

Hintz is a nationally recognized researcher with a primary focus on improving outcomes for high-risk and extremely premature infants. She is the principal investigator for neurodevelopmental follow-up in the NICHD Neonatal Research Network at Stanford. She is also principal investigator for the NIH-funded Neuroimaging and Neurodevelopmental Outcomes study, involving hundreds of extremely preterm infants from across the U.S., to investigate neonatal neuroimaging in predicting early childhood and school-age outcomes.

Additionally, Hintz is co-principal investigator for the California Perinatal Quality Care Collaborative-CCS High-Risk Infant Follow-Up, which is spearheading the mission to create a statewide framework for quality improvement processes from NICU discharge transition through early childhood.

“Dr. Hintz’s extensive experience and leadership have been formative in the Johnson Center’s growth and success,” said Christopher G. Dawes, president and chief executive officer at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital and Stanford Children’s Health. “Her passion for babies and families is legendary, and she’s dedicated to ensuring that everyone needing our high quality, preeminent care can access that care when it is needed. As co-director with Dr. El-Sayed, she will continue to lead the way in making our pregnancy and newborn services not just the best in Northern California, but also the best in the nation.”

Authors

Samantha Dorman
(650) 384-5826
sdorman@stanfordchildrens.org