Urology

Providing expert care to children and families

Boston Children's is home to  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.
 

Clinical highlights

• Boston 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.

• Boston 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 Boston 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.

Urology firsts at Boston Children's Hospital

Many urology "firsts" happened here. All of our expertise goes toward the same goal: treating and curing your child.

• First Department of Pediatric Urology at a major children's hospital. 
• First minimally invasive procedure to correct pediatric ureteral reflux.
• First laparoscopic removal of a kidney in a child in the eastern United States.
• First creation of a tissue engineered organ (bladder). 
• First training program in robotic assisted surgery for pediatric urologic conditions.
• First Bladder exstrophy support group and comprehensive care program. 
• First comprehensive, early bladder management program for children with neurogenic bladder.