Oldest Patient Returns to Tour Hospital—and Share Memories

Rebecca Neelis, Public Relations

Seymour Wheelock, MD, was admitted to The Children’s Hospital at nine months of age for a digestive disorder. Now 90, he returned to Children’s to share some insight from his time as a patient and doctor at the hospital.

What year were you born? 

“1918 at Mercy Hospital in Denver.”

What is a memory that stands out from your time as a patient at Children’s? 

“When I got my tonsils out at five, I remember the nurse asking, ‘are we getting our tonsils out today?’ I remember thinking she may be getting her tonsils out, but I’m going home.”

When did you begin working at The Children’s Hospital?  

“I came to Children’s in 1946 following a residency in Cincinnati and a fellowship in New Hampshire . I was the chief resident of pediatric service. At the time there were only three full-time staff in the medical school and three full-time physicians at Children’s including me. I ended up leaving for a couple years to work in the Army Medical Corp, but I returned to the hospital when I retired in 1983.”

Explain your experience creating Children’s adolescent ward: 

“At the time, we were getting more and more information that adolescents needed to be treated differently. So I went for a couple months training at Boston’s Children’s Hospital, where they had an adolescent ward, and came back to Denver to institute one at Children’s. We realized there needed to be a presence, but teens don’t need babysitting.”

What is your impression of the new hospital? 

“Very large and very lovely. I thought it was an airport when I drove up, but from the inside it looks more like a children’s museum.”

What are some changes between the hospital now and back then:   

“It was a mom-and-pop business back then—the scale of medical treatment was strictly family medicine. Now, it’s more about the hospitalist, a doctor that knows everything and is less specialized.

What is something you enjoyed from your years working at Children’s?

 “At the old hospital, there was a tunnel leading to the Boettcher School where long-term patients went for classes. One of the most gratifying experiences was to go over and watch those children get their high school diploma.”