For almost 125 years, Shaare Zedek has been part of the story of Jerusalem.
In January 1902, a delegation of dignitaries and local residents gathered in the courtyard of a newly built hospital on Jaffa Street to mark the opening of Shaare Zedek Hospital.
In those early days of the modern Zionist movement, there was a growing recognition that for Jerusalem to develop as a modern city, it needed a medical institution built on the foundations of compassionate care and advanced medicine.
From that humble 20-bed hospital on Jaffa Street, almost 125 years ago, Shaare Zedek has grown into one of Israel’s leading medical centres, with more than 1,000 inpatient beds, over 4,000 staff and more than one million patients treated every year.
But numbers alone cannot tell the story of Shaare Zedek. The true impact of the hospital can be seen in the moments that happen every day throughout the hospital. Take Chana, who this summer was being treated in the surgical intensive care unit with a complex medical condition that meant she needed to remain connected to respiratory support at all times.
When Chana’s daughter Michal and her fiancé Tal decided to bring forward their wedding, they faced an agonising reality: Chana might not be well enough to attend. So, the hospital found a way.
Working together, Shaare Zedek’s religious services department, respiratory support unit and surgical ICU made special arrangements to allow Chana to leave her ICU bed and attend the ceremony safely.
Using a specialised medical device available only at Shaare Zedek, with an extended-life battery providing continued respiratory support and monitoring, Chana was able to join her family and friends for the wedding. For a few precious hours, she was not a patient in intensive care. She was a mother at her daughter’s wedding.
It is a beautiful example of something that can be difficult to capture in statistics, at Shaare Zedek, medicine is about treating the person, not simply the condition.
That same combination of expertise and compassion is transforming the lives of patients like three-year-old Yusef Shweki. Yusef began intensive dialysis at Shaare Zedek when he was just five months old after being diagnosed with a rare genetic condition. His future appeared likely to involve years of dialysis and a highly complex combined liver and kidney transplant. The Lesley and Leon Berman Paediatric Dialysis Unit became a second home to Yusef and his family as Shaare Zedek’s multidisciplinary team searched for another possibility.
Through innovative gene therapy, combined with exceptional clinical expertise and personalised care, Yusef’s condition improved so dramatically that he was able to receive a kidney transplant alone, avoiding the need for a dual liver and kidney transplant.
Today, Yusef is thriving, riding his scooter, growing stronger and enjoying the freedom every child deserves.
And while individual stories demonstrate the impact of Shaare Zedek’s care, the hospital is also constantly investing in the facilities and technology needed to care for Jerusalem’s wider community.
This summer saw the opening of the newly upgraded paediatric shock, trauma and burn treatment centre in the Glaubach Department of Paediatric Emergency Medicine.
Every year, more than 40,000 children are treated in Shaare Zedek’s paediatric emergency department, making it the busiest paediatric emergency service in Jerusalem. The new centre has been designed to ensure children with traumatic injuries and burns receive rapid, expert treatment when every second counts, while providing a supportive environment for their families.
This is such an important part of Shaare Zedek’s story, a commitment to progress and innovation, without ever losing sight of the person at the centre of it all.
Shaare Zedek is a hospital where cutting-edge research and medical innovation sit alongside compassion. Where a child can benefit from pioneering gene therapy and a mother can be given the chance to rejoice at her daughter’s wedding. But none of this happens without investment and support.
From lifesaving equipment and specialist units to research, innovation and the everyday care provided to more than one million patients each year, the generosity of supporters helps Shaare Zedek continue to grow and meet the changing needs of Jerusalem and beyond.
shaarezedek.org.uk | info@shaarezedek.org.uk.
Registered charity 1143272