Pediatric Digestive Diseases

Pediatrics

Digestive Surgery

Children with digestive conditions and disorders, such as appendicitis, or more complex problems of the esophagus, liver, pancreas, stomach, and intestines, may require surgery to treat these conditions. At NewYork-Presbyterian’s two renowned children’s hospitals, NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital and NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Children's Hospital, our expert pediatric digestive surgeons collaborate in multidisciplinary teams with pediatric specialists to diagnose, monitor and treat a wide array of digestive conditions in even the smallest and most complex patients. Your child is in the expert hands of a team committed to providing our patients with the safest, most advanced techniques available to extend survival and quality of life.

About Our Program

NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital and NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Children's Hospital have built national reputations for outstanding care devoted to children. NewYork-Presbyterian’s Pediatric Digestive Surgery programs, offered at both children’s hospitals, provide the most advanced, safe, and proven treatments for digestive disorders in children of all ages.

Our multidisciplinary team of pediatric surgeons, neonatologists, gastroenterologists, anesthesiologists, and other subspecialists address the unique needs of infants born with congenital disorders of the digestive system, such as esophageal atresia, Hirschsprung's disease, and complex colorectal malformations. For these challenging and complex conditions, our team performs some of the most technically demanding and innovative procedures, using minimally invasive surgery whenever possible to ensure the best results and the fastest recovery possible. The team continues to closely follow our patients throughout their childhood years to manage the long-term impact that many congenital digestive disorders have on a child’s growth and development.

Our team also addresses digestive disorders in older children and adolescents, such as motility disorders and inflammatory bowel disease. We strive to take care of the whole child through a comprehensive understanding of how the digestive disease affects not only a child's health, but his or her daily life as well.

Because we are part of a world-class medical center, we have the ability to centralize care for our patients and connect our patients to providers in more than 100 specialties and subspecialties. When the time comes, we can provide the support patients and their families need to ensure a smooth transition from pediatric to adult care.

Our Approach to Care

At New York-Presbyterian, we believe that there is a solution for each child with a digestive disorder, and we rely on established expertise, as well as innovative thinking, to deliver unparalleled care for every patient.  We take a fully integrated approach to the treatment of digestive diseases in children, from infancy, childhood, and adolescence, to young adulthood. If surgery is necessary, we use the most advanced, minimally invasive approach possible to achieve the best outcomes.

Holistic and Comprehensive Care  

We recognize that every child with a digestive disorder has a unique set of symptoms, circumstances, and needs. We take a holistic approach to care that considers the entire patient, including his or her physical, emotional, and social factors.  We strive to partner with patients and their parents in shared decision-making, empowering them with knowledge, support, and the most effective treatment options to achieve the best possible outcome for every child.

Multidisciplinary Team Approach to Care

Our pediatric digestive surgery team consists of pediatric surgeons and specialists from a wide range of disciplines that collaborate to address the unique needs of each patient. Your child’s team may include pediatric gastroenterologists, pediatric anesthesiologists, pediatric urologists, pediatric radiologists, and other surgical subspecialists. This multidisciplinary team approach extends to the ongoing management of the digestive condition throughout the childhood years.

Newborn Specialty Care

Our pediatric surgeons closely collaborate with specialists at NewYork-Presbyterian’s two perinatal centers,the New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center Carmen and John Thain Center for Prenatal Pediatrics and the New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center Fetal Care Center,to counsel and plan surgery for neonatal (newborn) congenital abnormalities. Our team works closely with neonatologists and critical care specialists to care for the most fragile infants.

Minimally Invasive Surgery

Whenever possible, our pediatric surgeons use minimally invasive approaches for both diagnostic and therapeutic digestive procedures. This means smaller incisions, less discomfort, shorter healing times, and minimal scarring.  Our surgeons have expertise in:

  • Laparoscopy for complex digestive and hepatobiliary (having to do with the liver plus the gallbladder, bile ducts, or bile) conditions in newborns and children.
  • Single Incision Pediatric Endosurgery (SIPE) as well as other laparoscopic techniques which allow us to treat complex neonatal and pediatric gastrointestinal, esophageal and hepatobiliary conditions with essentially scarless surgery.

Why choose us

Nationally Ranked Children’s Hospitals

Both NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital and NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Children's Hospital are among the nation's leading centers for the diagnosis and treatment of childhood diseases. Both are major referral centers for complex and rare digestive disorders in infants, children, and adolescents.

Dedicated Digestive Disease Centers

Doctor performing ultrasound on childNewYork-Presbyterian has two dedicated digestive care centers that specialize in the unique needs of children:

  • Center for Advanced Digestive Care at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center is one of the nation's leading multidisciplinary centers for the diagnosis and treatment of digestive diseases in adult and pediatric patients. The CADC provides a single point of access to some of the nation's best doctors, newest technologies, and advanced therapies.
  • The NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center Division of Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition provides comprehensive pediatric care for a broad range of gastrointestinal, nutritional, and liver disorders. It has garnered a world-class reputation from its multidisciplinary team of physicians, researchers, dieticians, social workers, and nurses, and the unparalleled quality of its clinical programs and research accomplishments.

Outstanding Expertise and Innovation

Our pediatric digestive surgeons have gained national and international reputations for their expertise and innovative approaches to these digestive conditions:

  • Esophageal atresia:  NewYork-Presbyterian has decades of experience in the treatment of infants born with esophageal atresia, providing the most advanced technological approaches to repair the abnormality. At the NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center REACH Clinic (Researching Esophageal Atresia for Children’s Health) and at the Center for Advanced Digestive Care at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, pediatric surgeons use a minimally invasive surgical approach involving three small incisions in the chest, whenever possible. Coupled with a multidisciplinary team approach for the management of this condition, our team offers outstanding care with excellent outcomes.
  • Biliary atresia: NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia surgeons were the first to bring the Kasai Procedure from Japan to the U.S. This innovative surgery bypasses blocked bile ducts by connecting the liver directly to the intestinal tract, and can delay the need for transplant until age 10 to 15. By then the donor pool is larger and these patients will not have been on immune suppression from an early age.
  • Complex congenital anorectal malformations (ARM) and Cloacal malformations:  NewYork-Presbyterian is one of a few centers that treats anorectal malformations and cloacal malformations, which are very complicated birth defects involving the colon, rectum, urinary tract, and genital tract. Treatment involves complex urologic and genitourinary reconstruction. Our pediatric surgeons collaborate in multidisciplinary teams with urologic surgeons, pediatric radiologists, and other specialists to diagnose, treat, and manage the patient throughout childhood. We treat patients who are referred to us from all over the world.
  • Congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH): This condition occurs when the diaphragmatic components do not fuse properly, allowing the stomach, spleen, liver, and intestines to enter the chest cavity. Babies with CDH have small, underdeveloped lungs due to the presence of the abdominal organs in the chest. NewYork-Presbyterian provides comprehensive care for infants born with these anomalies:
    • Prenatal Care: If your fetus is found to have CDH, we'll begin planning his or her care before birth at our two prenatal care centers: the NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center’s Carmen and John Thain Center for Prenatal Pediatrics and the NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center’s Fetal Care Center. Our interdisciplinary team of experts cares for both you and your baby and provides you with the information you need to make informed decisions.
    • Newborn Care: If you have a child born with CDH, we can coordinate all of the facets of his or her care. Our CDH program brings together a team of pediatric specialists, including a pediatric surgeon, neonatologist, and cardiologist with special expertise in pulmonary hypertension, pulmonologist, gastroenterologist, orthopedist, developmental pediatrician, and psychologist to follow and manage your child's care throughout infancy and childhood.
  • Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD): Inflammatory bowel diseases like Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis are chronic conditions that can affect more than just the digestive system. Our pediatric surgeons specialize in minimally invasive, laparoscopic colon surgeries and are at the forefront of research into new and more advanced treatments. They collaborate in a larger team of IBD specialists that include pediatric gastroenterologists, nutritionists, immunologists, and social workers.
  • Pediatric digestive cancer surgery: Our teams provide comprehensive care of children with a variety of digestive liver, and biliary cancers. We apply the latest advances in diagnostics and treatments to dramatically improve the outcome for infants, children, and adolescents with cancer.
  • Adolescent bariatric surgery: Located at both NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley and NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky, the Centers for Adolescent Bariatric Surgery are among only a handful of U.S. centers approved to offer weight loss surgery to young patients. Our centers’ experts include specialists in pediatric gastroenterology, endocrinology, nutrition, psychiatry, surgery, and other specialties who work together to help adolescents achieve and maintain a healthy weight.
  • Emergency surgery: Children who develop serious nutritional challenges often come to us as pediatric surgical emergencies. We collaborate with specialists in pediatric gastroenterology and nutrition, and if needed, can perform intestinal transplantation surgery.
  • Liver, small bowel and multivisceral transplant: The Center for Liver Disease and Transplantation at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center specializes in caring for children with all forms of disease of the liver, small bowel, pancreas and stomach. Intestinal and multivisceral transplantation is a surgery that removes diseased or malfunctioning organs along the gastrointestinal tract and replaces them with healthy donor organs. With a world-renowned team of doctors in multiple specialties, families everywhere come to us for diagnosis, treatments, surgery, an transplantations, and long-term care.

Access to World-Class Pediatric Specialists

Your child's healthcare team has access to all of the various pediatric medical and surgical subspecialists who practice at NewYork-Presbyterian, ensuring that all of your child's medical needs can be addressed.

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NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital

NewYork-Presbyterian Komansky Children's Hospital