Children's National named Steven L. Shein, MD, FCCM, as the DC Lawyers Care for Children Professor of Critical Care Medicine.

Dr. Shein serves as chief of the multidisciplinary Division of Critical Care at Children's National, charged with caring for seriously ill or injured infants and children, supporting their families, educating tomorrow's clinicians and performing cutting-edge research. The division includes the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU), an embedded Neuro Intensive Care Unit and a critical care sedation service.

The big picture

Dr. Shein joins a distinguished group of Children's National physicians and scientists who hold an endowed chair. Children's National is grateful to generous donors who have altogether funded 52 professorships.

These appointments support groundbreaking work on behalf of children and their families. They foster new discoveries and innovations in pediatric medicine. Endowed professorships also carry prestige and honor that reflect both the recipient's achievements and the donor's commitment to advancing and sustaining knowledge.

Why it matters

Dr. Shein joined Children's National in 2025 after 12 years at Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio, where he served as chief of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine and held the Linsalata Family Distinguished Chair in Pediatric Critical Care and Emergency Medicine. Dr. Shein is a nationally recognized clinician, researcher and educator. He co-founded a research consortium dedicated to critical bronchiolitis (the most common disease seen in PICUs) and has authored more than 120 peer-reviewed manuscripts and numerous book chapters.

He is an internationally recognized expert in pediatric critical care, particularly in his research on acute respiratory failure. Through this professorship, he aims to build on the strengths of the division to propel it into one of the nation's best.

"In 1975, Children's National became one of the first pediatric critical care programs in the world. It is an honor to lead the division into its second fifty years. Thank you to our donors who recognize that professorships are foundational and transformational for academic programs like ours. These funds will be used for pilot grants to develop new research and knowledge, to support dissemination of our findings in journals and high-impact meetings, to enable faculty members to acquire cutting-edge skills that enhance our clinical practice and to support educational and quality improvement programs," said Dr. Shein. "Together, these efforts not only benefit our patients, their families and the team at Children's National; they advance the field of critical care and improve outcomes of children across the globe and into the future."

Moving the field forward

Established in 2017, the professorship was made possible through a generous investment from the DC Lawyers' Golf Classic. The tournament emerged from the friendship of co-founders John Devaney and Jerry Stouck and their families' critical care experiences at Children's National. Carter Phillips engaged his firm, Sidley Austin LLP, as the lead sponsor, which helped create the endowed fund. Over 14 years, the tournament raised $2 million to elevate critical care medicine.

The founding partners of the DC Lawyers' Golf Classic, through their vision and generosity, ensure that Dr. Shein and future holders of this professorship will launch bold, new initiatives to rapidly advance the field of pediatric critical care, elevate our leadership and improve entire lifetimes for children facing life-threatening illnesses and injuries.

"We are thrilled that Dr. Shein is assuming this professorship and hope it continues to ensure that critical care clinicians at Children's National can treat the whole child and their families with the best evidence and technology available," Mr. Stouck said.