Giannina Gaslini Children's Hospital

About Giannina Gaslini Children's Hospital

The Institute was founded in 1931 by an act of love and solidarity ofSenator Gerolamo Gaslini, who wished to honour his daughter, who passed away in her infancy. Gaslini wanted to ensure that children receive only the best possible type of treatment based on the most innovative research.

Istituto Gaslini started its activity way back in 1938; seventy-five years of history, sacrifice and dedication, always at the forefront in the fields of research and treatment, without ever betraying the ideals of the original Founder.

It is an exemplary history, and perhaps a unique one when one looks at its roots and subsequent development.

The complex consists of 20 annexes spread over an area of 73,000 m2 (two-thirds of which are green areas) that are well-connected to each other, even on an underground level. All its wards face a South South-Easterly direction, and were the inspiration for the motto "Pueris floribusque lumen solis" ("Give sunlight to children and to flowers").

Ever since its founding, Gerolamo Gaslini wanted to host part of the University of Genoa within the walls of the institute, with its own paediatrics chairs in order to ensure the qualified support offered by research and by the training of new generations of paediatricians, nurses and technicians. A few years later, he is known to have said: "I am not a man of science, but I am fully aware of the fact that it is only by starting from properly directed scientific research that doctors who take care of children can carry out their difficult job in full awareness and with a proper sense of integrity".

And to better understand how much importance the Founder gave to development and innovation, one only needs to go back to 1949, the year in which he gave up all his possessions (companies, factories, immovable property, shares, securities and even his own house) in order to merge them into the Gaslini Foundation, which he himself established and chaired. Moreover, Gaslini stated that the resources of his assets were to be unceasingly dedicated to the betterment of the Institutes's research, treatment and training activities.

Gerolamo Gaslini's intention was to create and perpetuate a unified, well-equipped and well-governed organisation, in which the experiences, knowledge and outcomes of the most advanced medical science would be able to find could find a position of constant confrontation, not only with the the world of scientific and technological research, but also with the practical needs of treatment and assistance.

Only through this ongoing exchange between clinical and research activities was the Institute able to ensure a more appropriate and instantly available service to children, or rather, to that particular segment of the world in which the dreams and hopes, not only of the children themselves, but of all humanity, reside.

Since 1988, the year of the death of Countess Germana Gaslini, the Founder's last heir, the Foundation was chaired by the protempore Archbishop of Genoa.

After its substantial and continuous activities (carried out even thanks to the constant efforts of the Foundation) were formally acknowledged, in 1959 the Institute was formally recognised as a Scientific Institute for Research, Hospitalisation and Healthcare. This title has been confirmed time and time again through the years.

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