— What’s New

In 2025, more than 400 critically ill infants were transported to UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals. UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals now have dedicated neonatal transport vehicles and teams in Oakland and San Francisco, reaching patients across the San Francisco Bay Area, the East Bay, Central Valley, and broader Northern California region. UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland serves the most patients for a freestanding pediatric trauma center in Northern California.  

When delivering radiation therapy to a tumor, clinicians want to be as precise as possible, using imaging, such as CT scans, to ensure the radiation targets the right area. However, when a tumor is located within the chest cavity or within or near the lungs, it is difficult to know that the tumor is in the same place when it is treated as when it was imaged. Each breath can cause the tumor to shift in position, making it difficult for clinicians to accurately target cancer cells without harming nearby tissue. Researchers are working to combat this complex issue through their research project, Development and Translation of Data-Driven Four-Dimensional Radiotherapy.

When visualizing tumors or delivering targeted radiation therapy, clinicians use imaging methods to locate cancer cells. However, with the complex nature of tumors, it is often difficult to isolate and treat cancerous material, which poses an unnecessary risk to nearby healthy tissue and organs, hindering the efficacy and efficiency of radiation therapy. Researchers from the CCIL and Siteman Cancer Center are collaborating to investigate this cancer targeting problem.

Every face is unique. Genetics helps to determine our features, but sometimes genes have errors, which, in early fetal development, can result in babies with facial differences such as a cleft lip or cleft palate. If not treated, these craniofacial conditions can have a major impact on a baby’s quality of life by interfering with a baby’s ability to see, breathe, speak clearly, and avoid ear infections. 

Cancer Center at Illinois researchers are leading a multi-institutional partnership to improve minimally invasive imaging technology for lung cancer treatment. The implications of this new technology are significant as lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. More people die of lung cancer than of colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined, according to the American Cancer Society.

Parenteral nutrition (PN) is a lifesaving means of nutritional support for thousands of hospitalized infants who cannot tolerate normal oral feeding due to the immaturity or surgical removal of the intestine due to congenital or disease-related causes. PN is a method of delivering nutrients directly into the bloodstream via an intravenous catheter, bypassing the digestive system entirely.

A serious complication of PN is the risk for a metabolic condition called parenteral nutrition-associated liver disease (PNALD), which can lead to liver failure if not managed. PNALD can affect up to 50% of premature infants given total PN for prolonged periods. This study investigated a way to protect the liver from long-term injury that occurs when bile flow from the liver is obstructed.