The Vatican-owned institution has climbed the global rankings again, cementing its place among the elite of paediatric medicine.
Rome’s Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù has been ranked the top children’s hospital in Europe and the sixth best in the world, according to Newsweek’s annual World’s Best Hospitals ranking. The result marks another step forward for an institution that has quietly become one of the most important centres of paediatric medicine in the world, with a history as remarkable as its present-day achievements.
From a Single Room to a Global Benchmark
The hospital was founded on March 19, 1869, through the initiative of the Salviati family. At the time, no distinction was made between patients of different ages, and children were admitted to the same wards as adults, a practice that significantly undermined the quality and appropriateness of their care.
Arabella Fitz-James, wife of Duke Scipione Salviati, championed the creation of a dedicated paediatric facility and organised a fundraising campaign among Rome’s noble families. The first patients, four young girls, were admitted to a single room in Via delle Zoccolette, between the Tiber River and Torre Argentina.
In 1924, the Salviati family donated the hospital to the Holy See, and it became known to Romans as “the Pope’s Hospital.” Every pontiff since has maintained a close connection to it. The hospital has been visited by Pope John XXIII in 1958, Paul VI in 1968, John Paul II in 1979, Benedict XVI in 2005, and Pope Francis in 2017.
A Research Powerhouse
The hospital’s transformation into a global leader accelerated in the second half of the twentieth century. In 1985, it received official recognition as an IRCCS (Institute for Hospitalisation and Care of a Scientific Nature), confirming its dual role as both a clinical and research institution.
The decades that followed saw a series of major medical milestones. In 1986, the hospital performed the first paediatric heart transplant in Italy, launching the era of paediatric cardiac surgery and transplantation in the country. In 1993, it carried out the first combined heart-kidney transplant, followed by Italy’s first paediatric lung transplant in 1995. In 2018, it treated the first Italian patient with refractory leukaemia using CAR-T cell therapy.
Today, Bambino Gesù is one of only a handful of European centres authorised to perform all types of organ, cell, and tissue transplants in paediatric patients. In 2023 alone, the hospital carried out 348 transplants and implanted five artificial hearts.
Its scientific activity is equally significant. In the same year, the hospital produced more than 1,000 scientific publications, managed nearly 700 active research projects, and conducted over 430 clinical trials.
Scale and Scope
Today, Bambino Gesù is the largest paediatric polyclinic and research centre in Europe, operating across six sites in the greater Rome area. The hospital has 627 beds, including 40 intensive care beds and 22 neonatal semi-intensive care beds.
Its San Paolo site houses advanced research laboratories, including a pharmaceutical facility dedicated to producing advanced therapies.
The hospital’s activity levels are enormous. In a recent year it recorded nearly 95,000 emergency room visits, 29,000 hospital admissions, 32,000 surgical and interventional procedures, and approximately 2.5 million outpatient consultations.
More than 30 percent of patients admitted to the hospital come from outside the Lazio region, while about 14 percent are international patients, highlighting the institution’s global reach.
Over 18,000 patients at Bambino Gesù are registered within the rare diseases network, and the hospital participates in 20 of the 24 European Reference Networks dedicated to rare diseases, the highest number of any paediatric centre in Europe.
Beyond Italy’s Borders
The hospital’s mission extends well beyond Rome. Through partnerships with governments, hospitals, and humanitarian organisations, Bambino Gesù currently runs international cooperation projects in eleven countries, including Jordan, Cambodia, Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Peru, and Colombia.
These programmes combine remote training, on-site support at partner hospitals, and residential training periods in Rome for doctors and medical staff from around the world.
Recognition from Newsweek
The Newsweek ranking combines surveys of healthcare professionals worldwide with independent data on quality of care, patient safety, and clinical outcomes. This year’s ranking evaluated 2,500 hospitals across 32 countries.
Bambino Gesù’s rise from ninth to sixth place globally, while retaining its position as Europe’s top children’s hospital, reflects both the scale of its operations and the strength of its research programme.
For Italian healthcare, the recognition is a rare piece of unequivocally positive news. With more than 3,000 professionals on staff, including doctors, researchers, nurses, technicians, and administrative staff, and a history stretching back more than 155 years, Bambino Gesù stands as proof that world-class excellence continues to emerge from Italy’s public health system, one young patient at a time.
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