A place to heal, hope, and play: UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital dedicates playroom a Panda Cares® Center of Hope
A place to heal, hope, and play: UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital dedicates playroom a Panda Cares® Center of Hope
CLEVELAND, OHIO — A special space just got even more meaningful at UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital. The hospital has officially dedicated one of its patient playrooms as a Panda Cares® Center of Hope, a joyful and healing environment made possible through the longstanding generosity of Panda Express® and its customers.
This heartfelt dedication recognizes the more than $328,000 raised by Panda Express associates and guests to support the hospital’s Family and Child Life Services (FCLS) Department—a critical part of care that helps children and families navigate the emotional side of illness and hospitalization.
“Family and Child Life Services is critical to the psycho-social and emotional well-being of the patients and families we serve here at UH Rainbow,” said Dr. Marlene Miller, Pediatrician-in-Chief at University Hospitals. “This team of dedicated professionals help prepare children for medical procedures, and offer coping strategies to patients and their family members during a hospitalization. We’re incredibly grateful to Panda Express for their ongoing support and are proud to honor them with this special space.”
For more than five decades, UH Rainbow’s Family and Child Life Services team has offered comfort and support to young patients and their families. The department includes child life specialists, art and music therapists, a horticultural therapist, and even special education teachers—all working together to ease fear, manage pain, and support healing through play, creativity, and connection.
The newly dedicated Center of Hope joins a growing list of similar spaces across the country. Powered by Panda Express and created in partnership with Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, each Center of Hope provides comforting, developmentally appropriate environments designed to inspire hope, courage, and joy for pediatric patients.
“We are proud to partner with Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals to bring the vision of the Panda Cares® Center of Hope to life and are humbled to be part of the healing journey for the families and kids at these hospitals,” said Dr. Peggy Cherng, co-founder and co-CEO of Panda Restaurant Group. “Children are our future, and through this partnership and curriculum designed to give children the strength to thrive, we will bring smiles and hope to communities nationwide.”
Since 2007, Panda Express has raised more than $190 million nationwide for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, supporting programs like this at hospitals from Hawaii to Washington, D.C.—and right here in Cleveland. Every dollar raised in-store and online at Panda Express locations directly benefits children in that local community.
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About UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital
Internationally renowned, UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital is a full-service children’s hospital and pediatric academic medical center. Experts in 16 medical divisions and 11 surgical specialties offer nationally ranked care not available at other institutions in the region, including a center dedicated to adolescent and young adult cancer treatment, and Northeast Ohio’s only single-site provider of advanced maternal-fetal medicine and neonatology services. As an affiliate of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, and one of the only Level I Pediatric Trauma Center in the region, UH Rainbow offers access to novel therapies, advanced technologies and clinical discoveries long before they are available elsewhere. Rainbow pediatric specialists – all of whom also serve on the faculty at the School of Medicine – are engaged in today’s most advanced clinical research and are widely regarded as the best in the country and beyond. Learn more at UHRainbow.org.
About Panda Express®
Panda Express, the largest Asian dining concept in the US, is a family-owned and operated restaurant brand founded in 1983 by Co-Founders and Co-CEOs Andrew and Peggy Cherng. Driven by a mission to inspire better lives, Panda Express is recognized as a trailblazer in American Chinese cuisine. The company has pioneered iconic dishes like The Original Orange Chicken® and award-winning Honey Walnut Shrimp, creating a variety of industry-first recipes. Each dish at Panda Express is thoughtfully crafted with quality ingredients and inspired by authentic Chinese flavors and culinary principles. With over 2,500 locations across the country and a presence in 11 international countries, Panda Express continues to share American Chinese cuisine with the world.
Powered by a global family of associates, Panda Cares®, Panda’s philanthropic arm, has raised more than $415 million and has dedicated countless volunteer hours in bettering the health and education for over 16 million youth, as well as supporting communities in need since 1999. In 2021, Panda Express established the Panda CommUnity Fund™ — a five-year, $10 million community investment and response program that supports immediate and sustainable solutions from national and local organizations to uplift diverse groups, including people of color and other marginalized communities. For more information about Panda, visit pandaexpress.com, or find us on Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok.
About Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals
Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals was founded more than 40 years ago with the vision to Change Kids’ Health, Change the Future. We’ve raised over $9 billion for 170 children’s hospitals by empowering and engaging with local communities and businesses – and we’re not done yet. All donations benefit local member hospitals to fund what’s needed most, like critical life-saving treatments and healthcare services, innovative research, vital pediatric medical equipment, child life services that put kids’ and families’ minds at ease during difficult hospital stays, and financial assistance for families who could not otherwise afford these health services.
Together, we can change kids’ health. Together, we can change the future. To learn about Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals and your local member children’s hospital, visit cmnhospitals.org.