Our stories

Indigenous communities help shape new CHEO treatment centre

CHEO is highlighting its engagement with First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities featuring different perspectives from various Indigenous partners. 

This article features a conversation with Anita Tenasco, Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg, on CHEO's new Integrated Treatment Centre.

The new CHEO Integrated Treatment Centre has engaged First Nations, Inuit, and Métis partners to ensure the building, spaces and care are welcoming and inclusive for everyone.

The treatment centre, set to open in 2028, will improve care and...

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“CHEO is the reason I moved to Ottawa.” – Jessica McAdam

Meet Jessica McAdam, Registered Nurse First Assistant with Perioperative Services-Operating Room

“CHEO is the community that gave me a permanent home,” says Jessica, a registered nurse (RN) with CHEO since 2009. Growing up in a military family, Jessica spent her childhood moving across North America. But today, she considers the CHEO community her home base and rather than move from city to city, like she did as a child in a military family, she expands her nursing skills while staying in one...

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One woman’s crusade for a children's hospital in Ottawa

Barbara Mair says she’s never been backward about coming forward to fight for things she cares about.

That’s why, as president of the volunteer CHEO Auxiliary in the 1960s,she helped lead a group of women that refused to back down when detractors thought Ottawa didn’t need a children’s hospital.

They claimed Ottawa’s adult hospitals had space and expertise to treat kids, and money would be better spent elsewhere.

“The women of the community had other thoughts,” said Mair.

“We spent many years convincing people that children...

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CHEO became a comfort for Fei Fan as a new mother

Meet Fei Fan Chen, a Housekeeper with CHEO’s Environmental Services team

At six months pregnant, Fei Fan immigrated to Canada from China. At the time, little did she know the role CHEO would end up playing in her life or that it would become the place that would guide her in her early days as a mother to her newborn son Gabriel.

Fei Fan’s pregnancy had been uncomplicated and without concern – that is, until her first ultrasound in Canada. During her seven-month ultrasound, everything changed. Her...

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Former volunteer, now 108 years old, helped weave CHEO into fabric of Ottawa

Juanita Snelgrove has dedicated her life to helping children in her community through many decades of volunteer work, all while raising three children as a single mother.

Snelgrove, now 108 years old, was a former volunteer at CHEO. 

“It was a wonderful organization to be a part of. I had the opportunity to be connected in many little ways, along the way,” said Snelgrove, who now has four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

As CHEO marks 50 years since it opened its doors on May 17, 1974,...

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