Urology

Dr. David Diamond is Boston Children's new urologist-in-chief

David A. Diamond, MD, has been named urologist-in-chief and chair of Boston Children’s Hospital’s Department of Urology.

David A. Diamond, MD

Dr. Diamond succeeds Alan B. Retik, MD, who founded what is now the Department of Urology when he arrived at Boston Children’s in 1977. Dr. Retik will remain at Boston Children’s as senior associate in Urology and as executive director of the hospital’s International Health Services.

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Who We Are

The Department of Urology at Children's Hospital Boston evaluates, diagnoses and treats infants, children and adolescents with disorders of the genital and urinary organs. If your child has one of these disorders, whether it's a relatively common condition or a rare, complex congenital condition, we can help you.

Children's is the largest pediatric urology department in the world, with physicians who are experts in a wide range of proven procedures, from simple kidney stone removal to complete repair of bladder exstrophy (a rare birth defect in which the bladder is inside out and exposed outside the body).

We perform more than 2,600 surgical procedures each year and care for almost 15,000 children from throughout the country and all over the world. Many urology "firsts" happened here. All of our expertise goes toward the same goal: treating and curing your child.

Our expertise:

Children's pioneered the use of robotic surgery for complex procedures through small incisions, reducing pain, recovery time, and hospital stays. Today we perform more pediatric robotic surgeries than any other hospital in the world, and train physicians around the country to do them.
Special counseling programs, such as the bladder exstrophy support group, are opportunities for children and their families to learn, receive emotional support and meet others who have shared similar experiences.
Children's offers many specialty clinics, such as the exstrophy-epispadias program, the voiding improvement program (for bedwetting and toilet training problems), the perinatal urology program (for genitourinary problems diagnosed in a fetus during pregnancy) and a Gender Management Service Clinic.
Physicians at Children's Kidney Stone Center perform metabolic evaluations on each child to check for dietary or environmental factors that can lead to development of a stone.
Our researchers are at the forefront of laboratory investigation. Their studies range from seeking a urine test for interstitial cystitis, a hard-to-diagnose condition causing chronic pelvic pain, to developing treatments for bladder exstrophy while the fetus is still in the womb.

Discover : Urology

Childrens Hosptial Boston, Urology Department Robots help bring urology care home

The most expensive way to deliver medical care is in the hospital, but if you send patients home too early, you run the risk of complications. Could videoconferencing robots be part of the answer? Dr. Hiep Nguyen is piloting a telehealth program that sends robots home with children after urologic surgery to help monitor their recovery. Read more in the Boston Globe and on Vector.

Did you know?

Growing organs in the lab

Children's Hospital Boston was the first to create a tissue engineered organ—a bladder that is now being tested in patients with poor bladder function due to spina bifida.

Fluorescence imaging and diagnosing congenital kidney obstructions

Congenital obstructions in the ureter (the tube between the kidneys and bladder) are the most common cause of childhood kidney failure. Children's Hiep Nguyen, MD, wants to find a better way of detecting obstructions that doesn't require radiation. (L: healthy kidney. R: obstructed kidney. Image courtesy Hiep Nguyen)