The Advanced Practice Provider Fellowship Programs at Children’s Specialized Hospital have achieved accreditation with distinction by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation in Practice Transition Programs.
Accreditation with distinction is the highest recognition awarded by the ANCC’s Accreditation Program.
CSH offers two fellowships annually to Advanced Practice Nurses. The Developmental Pediatric Fellowship and the Pediatric Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Fellowship are both one year training programs. These programs provide APNs with the necessary foundation and tools to meet the needs of children and families facing neurodevelopmental and neuromuscular conditions affecting their daily lives.
APN Fellows at CSH rotate through various clinical areas in the hospital such as developmental behavioral pediatrics, physiatry, psychiatry, special needs primary care pediatrics, acute inpatient rehabilitation, pediatric long-term care, in addition to occupational, physical, speech and psychological therapies during their fellowship year. They also complete the yearlong LEND (Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities) fellowship at the Boggs Center on Disability and Human Development at Rutgers University.
“I’m extremely proud of this team and their hard work to earn this milestone achievement,” Chief Medical Officer Colin O’Reilly said. “At Children’s Specialized Hospital, we employ over 25 APNs who provide care for patients across a broad range of hospital specialty services. These programs will allow us to enhance and expand those offerings, increasing access to care for families in need of our highly sought-after specialties.”
Children’s Specialized Hospital, part of the Children’s Health network at RWJBarnabas Health.
These fellowship programs were developed by Kelly Keefe Marcoux, the chief nursing officer at Children’s Specialized Hospital in 2016 in response to the overwhelming need for highly trained pediatric subspecialty providers in these fields. To date, the program has graduated and hired nine APNs with two more slated to begin their fellowships in September 2025.
“Achieving this accreditation with distinction will allow us to continue to recruit and hire well qualified APPs from across the country,” she said. “Through teamwork and our shared purpose, this program will help us to ensure a world where all children can reach their full potential.”
