Boston Children’s Hospital announced it received a record-breaking donation Wednesday: $100 million to transform the future of pediatric behavioral health care.
Rob and Karen Hale made the gift and said, for them, the donation was personal after friends would come to them over the years asking for advice with their kids’ mental health struggles.
“There was no access to be had, there were no rooms, there was no help to be had,” Rob Hale said. “That was probably the most startling to Karen and I was, ‘My goodness, these kids need help, and they can’t get help, and we have to try to help to create access for them.’”
The money will help build a new behavioral health facility on the Brighton campus of Franciscan Children’s, which became part of the Boston Children’s health system in 2023.
“Franciscan’s an amazing place, but we live in a really old facility,” said Vincent Chiang, the facility’s interim president. “[The donation] means the facility will match the level of care that [providers] are giving.”
The new building will increase inpatient and outpatient care and support new research.
In June, the World Health Organization issued an alert about the declining mental health of children around the world.
“Given the crisis that we’ve all felt since COVID, and watching the transition over my 40 years of work of what’s happened in behavioral science and behavioral health, this need and demand is not going to go away,” said Boston Children’s Hospital COO Dick Argys. “This is something that’s going to be permanent in our society, and so for us to have the ability to build new buildings, to start new programs, to be innovative, to use research, to augment the clinical programs — it’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
The Hales told NBC10 Boston they want to make sure every family that comes to Boston Children’s Hospital feels supported and never alone.
“Every family in America has, in my opinion, mental health issues with children, and it’s not a negative, it’s just a reality,” Hale said. “Every family. Seek help immediately, because it will get better.”