Comcast CEO Brian Roberts and his wife, Aileen, are donating $125 million to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia to support the construction of a new patient tower at the hospital's growing campus in University City.
The gift is the largest CHOP has ever received and will help complete a 24-story building that will house multiple specialties and new services for patients and their families. It also will pay for renovations at CHOP's main hospital at 34th Street and Civic Center Boulevard, which opened in the 1970s and last underwent upgrades in the 2000s.
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Roberts, who has been at the helm of Comcast since 2002, called CHOP "a magnet for the greatest medical talent" and said the planned Roberts Children's Health tower will continue the hospital's 170-year legacy of innovation in pediatric care.
The $2 billion patient tower, expected to open in 2028, is under construction at the site of the former Wood Center beside CHOP's main hospital. It will cover 1.3 million square feet and will have more than 700 private patient rooms. More than 30 procedure and imaging rooms will be dedicated to cardiology, neurology and other specialties. Families will have access to a fitness center, entertainment hub and mental health services. Each floor will have a lounge, pantry and private rooms for remote work.
CHOP President and CEO Madeline Bell said the Roberts family's generosity will help "revolutionize how we provide care" and position the health system to treat generations of children.
Roberts previously contributed to CHOP with the 2017 opening of the Roberts Center for Pediatric Research in Devils Pocket and the Roberts Collaborative for Genetics and Individualized Medicine.
CHOP is in the midst of a construction boom. The 17-story Morgan Center for Innovation & Research is expected to open later this year next to the Roberts Center. That building will have spaces for wet labs, genome sequencing and other research facilities that support clinical programs at the Roberts Center. Three years ago, CHOP opened its Hub for Clinical Collaboration, another 17-story tower for office and academic space, in University City.
Elsewhere in the city, CHOP has opened its Center for Behavioral Health at 4601 Market St. and a psychiatric facility with a 24/7 crisis response center at 52nd and Cedar Avenue in West Philadelphia in recent years.
The Roberts family's philanthropic efforts in Philadelphia span across the arts, education and health care sector, including a $15 million gift that helped Penn Medicine open a proton therapy cancer treatment center at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in 2006.
"They have helped propel us to the forefront of pediatric genetics research," Bell said of the family's past support. "Now, we'll be able to translate that research into extraordinary care more quickly and help more children live healthier lives."
