The organization was first founded on August 4, 1949, to help raise money to build a children's hospital. Carolyn Peck, Gail Goodwin, Helen Maupin, Agnes Crocket and Patty Randal proposed the idea of making the pediatric hospital in the valley and are now the Founding Mothers of Valley Children's Hospital. In the 1940s there were a small number of pediatric hospitals around the nation and none in the central valley. For three years, these women gathered support for building a pediatric hospital to benefit their children and the children from other families' health. The hospital later opened in 1952 at the intersection of Shields and Millbrook in central Fresno. In 1971 the regional NICU originally opened with a capacity eight beds. The hospital opened their pediatric emergency department in 1975 to provide comprehensive pediatric emergency services to the region. In 1998 they moved to a 50-acre site in Madera County, on the other side of the
San Joaquin River from Fresno. In 2014 the hospital had 12,695 pediatric inpatient admissions and performed 12,265 pediatric surgeries. In June 2015, Valley Children's Healthcare announced a decision to separate from
UCSF Fresno and instead partner with Stanford University for medical education and research. In 2018, the hospital was officially verified as a Level II pediatric trauma center by the
American College of Surgeons, making them the only pediatric trauma center in the region. In late 2019 it was announced that Valley Children's Hospital had partnered with Universal Health Services to build a new 128-bed pediatric behavioral health hospital. In early 2020, the hospital followed suit of hospitals all over the United States and implemented strict visitation protocols to help prevent the spread of COVID-19. In 2024, Valley Children's Hospital executives received criticism for high compensation. As reported on the organization's
Form 990, CEO Todd Suntrapak received compensation of over $5,000,000 in 2020 and 2021, with five other executives receiving compensation over $1,000,000, well above the average for similarly sized hospital systems. In addition, most of its legally mandated direct community investment was passed to its associated medical group, which was criticized by hospital finance experts as "gaming the system" and unusual. Fresno city councilmembers Miguel Arias and Garry Bredefeld asked for the state attorney general to investigate, while a hospital spokesperson stated the large compensation in 2020 and 2021 was as a result of an accounting change. == About ==