Special Guests and Entertainment Guidelines

Thank you for your interest in bringing a special event or visitor to patients and families at Stony Brook Children’s Hospital. We have been honored over the years to have welcomed many special visitors such as musical groups, celebrities, professional sports teams, educational performers, valued community leaders and other therapeutic entertainment for our hospitalized patients.

To ensure the well-being and privacy of our patients we carefully screen prospective entertainers. If you would like to offer your entertainment in the hospital, we ask that you read through the guidelines below. Please call our Child Life Program at (631) 216-3636 with questions and to suggest an entertainment event for child life programming.

GUIDELINES

Visitors are limited to five people per visit. If more than five show up at the time of the visit, only five will be allowed onto the unit.

Please make sure that everyone who visits is not sick, has not had a recent exposure to a communicable disease such as Chicken Pox or TB, and does not have flu-like symptoms (fever, chills, nausea, vomiting, body aches).

All special visitors must be 16 years of age or older. Children between 16 and 18 years of age must be chaperoned by an adult.

Entertainment visits are limited to one hour, as our pediatric patients tire more easily than non-hospitalized patients and they need their rest.

Business cards, religious fliers or literature may not be distributed in the hospital.

Visitors may not take photographs on their personal devices. All photographs for media purposes will be taken on hospital devices and shared by the hospital with your group or organization when a Stony Brook University Consent and Release Agreement is signed by all people who are to be photographed.  

Many of our patients are on special diets, and some are not able to eat at all. Therefore no edible treats (candy, cookies, beverages, etc.) are allowed.

All hospital visits will be accompanied and supervised by a child life specialist or assigned child life volunteer. On certain occasions you may be asked to provide entertainment at a patient’s bedside, also under the supervision of a child life specialist. 

To protect patients’ and families’ privacy rights, we are unable to disclose information regarding a patient’s reason for hospitalization. Please do not ask staff, volunteers, family members or patients themselves about the reason for their hospitalization.