Jill de Jong, MD, PhD

My name is Dr. Jill de Jong. I'm a pediatric hematologist oncologist and the Director of Pediatric Hematology at Comer Children's Hospital at the University of Chicago. My main practice area is hematology, meaning blood diseases. So that includes red blood cells and white blood cells and platelets, bleeding problems, clotting problems, and all aspects of that, including hematologic malignancies like leukemia.

I was mostly inspired by my father, who was a scientist. So I worked in my father's lab when I was in high school and loved talking about science, loved talking about biology and how the body works and what can go wrong and what can cause disease.

And because of that love of science but also a desire to take care of people and help to heal disease, I was inspired to do an M.D. PhD program when I was-- after I graduated from college. So I have training in cancer biology, which is my PhD, and also expertise in hematology.

Comer is a really amazing place filled with people at all levels, doctors, nurses, parking staff, people at the front desk, who really are passionate about caring for children. I find at the University of Chicago, there's this inherent curiosity in people, which I love because I love being in this environment of just trying to understand what's going on and how we can try and make somebody's disease better.

Sometimes that's really easy. And sometimes it's really difficult. And being surrounded with people who are also curious and also interested in trying to move forward knowledge about medicine is really inspiring.

I love caring for children. When I was in medical school, I knew I wanted to be a cancer doctor. But I didn't know for sure if I wanted to do medicine or pediatrics, adult medicine or pediatrics. And my friends said when I chose pediatrics, oh, we always knew you were going to be a pediatrician.

So I think part of it is my personality, that I love taking care of children. I love taking care of children who are ill so that they can become better but also taking care of their whole family and recognizing that a child is not just an isolated patient. They are in the context of their parents and their siblings and their grandparents and their school. And I want them to be living their life to the fullest. But I love their energy. I love how they are kids even when they're sick. Kids are kids even when they're sick.