1858

Back in the colonial days, a General Hospital was built in the Kandang Kerbau District. It was segregated into two sections – one section for the Europeans (the Seaman’s Hospital) and the other for the locals (the Police Hospital).

1872

In an attempt to control the spread of venereal disease, the female ward of the hospital was converted into a Lock Hospital, for compulsory screening and treatment of women with venereal diseases.

1888

With a change in the law, compulsory screening and treatment were stopped. The facilities at the Lock Hospital were then used as a home for women and girls.

1905

Female pauper patients from Tan Tock Seng Hospital were transferred to the General Hospital at Kandang Kerbau District. Subsequently, the hospital was also used to house female lepers and poor children. It eventually became the Pauper Hospital for Women and Children.

1924

The Pauper Hospital for Women and Children was converted into a free maternity hospital – a hospital for the poor who could not afford to pay the medical fees. On 1 October 1924, Kandang Kerbau Hospital (KK Hospital) was opened with 30 beds and 12 children’s cots. The hospital was led by Professor J S English, Singapore’s first Professor of O&G. On that momentous day, five babies were born – three Malays, one Chinese and a Japanese. In those days, maternal and infant mortality rates were high. The hospital’s mission then was to provide good maternity care and midwifery training for medical students and pupil midwives to bring the mortality rates down.

1938

Half of the 11,206 babies born in Singapore were delivered at KK.

1942

During World War II, KK was converted into an Emergency General Hospital for the treatment of war casualties. It became known as Chua Byoin (Central Hospital) during the Japanese Occupation, and served as a General Hospital for Japanese civilians and the local community. The late Dr Benjamin Henry Sheares, who became Singapore’s Second President in 1971, was its Deputy Medical Superintendent then.

1946

After the war was over, KK remained as the Civil General Hospital until 1 July 1946. It then resumed its function as the only O&G hospital serving the country.

1950

In the post war years, births averaged over 1,000 a month (13,238 for the year) in the 240-bed hospital. The labour wards were so overcrowded that patients were delivered on trolley beds. To ease the shortage of beds, the length of stay of each patient was shortened from 10 – 12 days to three days.

1952

The School of Midwifery was set up.

1954

To cope with the high demand for beds, the Domiciliary Aftercare service was started. It looked after women who had been discharged 24 hours after confinement. The patients were carefully selected and if their homes were found suitable, they were brought home by ambulance. Midwives would visit them at home and report any abnormality to the hospital for follow-up action. Each day, about 20 – 30 women were discharged to be cared for by this service.

1955

In August, the Domiciliary Delivery service was introduced. Women who had received antenatal care at the hospital were given the option of hospital delivery or home delivery, after assessment of the suitability of their homes for delivery. In September, the service saw the delivery of its first baby. A new extension to the building was also added. This saw an increase in beds, new operating theatres, an X-ray department and clinics for women and children.

1958

To meet the needs of newborns, nurseries were equipped for specialised care for the sick and premature babies. Incubators were used for the first time in the premature baby nurseries. This helped to lower the infant mortality.

1961

The bed capacity was increased to 438 beds.

1962

All the hospital’s wards, two operating theatres for gynaecology, two theatres for obstetrics and two minor operating theatres were opened. The hospital was reorganised into three training units – University Unit, and Training Units A and B. Under this new structure, the three units concentrated on complicated cases and the training of doctors, while the Maternity Home Unit undertook the bulk of routine delivery.

1963

As a result of the reorganisation, posts in the Training Units were recognised by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG).

1965

A Blood Transfusion Service branch in the hospital was opened and a Cytology Unit was set up. Antenatal classes were also started by the Physiotherapy Department.

1966

The number of deliveries continued to rise, reaching a record high of 39,835. This won KK Hospital a place in the Guinness Book of Records for having the largest number of births in a single maternity facility in that year – a record it held for ten years. More than 85% of all the births took place in KK, where over 100 babies were delivered daily.

1968

As the number of births started to decrease, the hospital’s Domiciliary Delivery and Domiciliary Aftercare services were no longer needed and stopped.

Following the success of the nation’s family planning programmes in the 1970s, the total number of births at KKH fell below 30,000 for the first time.

1978

In February, the School of Midwifery at KK Hospital was transferred to the School of Nursing at the Singapore General Hospital, and the school building demolished.

1985

The hospital’s University Unit moved to the National University Hospital.

1990

On 1 April 1990, KK ended its 132-year history as a government hospital and embarked on a new chapter in its history as a restructured hospital. The O&G and Neonatology Departments from Toa Payoh and Alexandra Hospitals moved to KK.  With optimal consolidation of expertise and resources, three O&G departments were created to focus on subspecialty interests -- Maternal Fetal Medicine, Gynaecological Oncology & Urogynaecology, and Reproductive Medicine.

1992

Construction on a new building for the new hospital began.

1995

KK launches Asia’s first (and the first outside the USA) O&G World Wide Web information service. It also becomes the first medical institution in Singapore to provide patient and public education in cyberspace.

1997

As a natural extension of the services that KKH was providing for women and their newborns, paediatric services were introduced. The paediatric medical services from three national hospitals were centralised at KKH.

KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital (KKH) was born. Housed in its new premises at 100 Bukit Timah Road, the hospital included Singapore’s first and only purpose-built Children’s Hospital. The Children’s Hospital, which sees children from birth to 16 years old, is a tertiary referral centre for paediatric bone marrow transplants and open-heart surgeries. It is also a primary paediatric teaching hospital of the National University of Singapore, Faculty of Medicine.

1998

The hospital's unique architectural design bags an award at the Singapore Architectural Design Awards for affording both patients and staff an excellent working environment departing from the traditional sterile environments of hospitals.

The nation’s first Child Safety Centre opens. A programme of the hospital, it educates parents on making the home and road environments safer for children to reduce the incidence of childhood injuries.

2000

• KKH is awarded the Family Friendly Firm Award by Singapore's Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS). This is for the many work-life initiatives put in place over the years to help staff achieve a balance between work and personal commitments.
• SPRING Singapore (previously the Productivity and Standards Board) awards KKH the coveted People Developer award. The award recognises the hospital's investment in a comprehensive system for developing our people and to bring out the best in them.

2002

The hospital wins the Family Friendly Firm Award for a second time.

2003

The old Kandang Kerbau Hospital, birthplace of over 1.2 million Singaporeans, is now a historic site marked by the National Heritage Board. This is in recognition of the hospital's contribution to the provision of obstetrical and gynaecological care in Singapore since 1858. The hospital is also re-certified as a People Developer company by SPRING Singapore.

2004

KKH won the Best Work-Life Balance Practices Award at the HRM Singapore Awards. On 20 October, the KK Alumni is established to encourage networking among former and present KKH staff. This is to generate ideas and initiatives in the areas of continuing medical education, training, technology and outreach to the community.

2005

• KKH achieved the Singapore Quality Class Award. It is conferred by SPRING Singapore to selected organisations, which have demonstrated commitment to business excellence, measured in the following dimensions – Leadership, Planning, Information, People, Process, Customers and Results.
• KKH achieved the prestigious Joint Commission International (JCI) accreditation on 9 December 2005. This accreditation recognises the hospital’s performance in complying with the international healthcare quality standards set by JCI. It demonstrates our strong commitment to patient safety and continuous improvement to our patient care processes and outcomes.

2006

• New services are introduced. They are a Breast Centre, a Minimally Invasive Surgery (MIS) Centre, Mental Wellness, Sports Medicine, Adolescent Medicine, Women’s Ambulatory Geriatric Service, a Mature Couples’ Clinic, a Musculoskeletal Oncology Service, a Spine Service and a newborn screening service to detect errors of metabolism.
• KKH is the first hospital in Southeast Asia accredited to treat uterine fibroids using non-invasive treatment guided by the latest magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
• The KK Breast Centre is the first in the world to use the FDA-approved computed radiography technology for mammography combined with computer-aided detection. This detects cancers at the earliest stage, when cure is highly probable.

2007

• More new services are introduced. These include an expanded Children's Cancer Centre, Eye Centre, Pain Management Service, Psychosocial Trauma Support Service, Obstetric Ultrasound Teaching and Training Centre, and the Paediatric Simulation Training Centre.
• KKH receives certification for ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 in recognition of its pursuit to attain the best quality care and services that are consistent and continuously improved on.
• KKH is the first restructured hospital to be certified Pro-Family Business Mark.

2008

• KKH celebrates its 150^th anniversary.
• KKH signs a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Medical Systems Division of GE Pacific Pte Ltd (GEHC) to train more overseas fellows under the hospital's Obstetric Ultrasound Teaching and Training Programme.

2009

• KKH's accreditation with the Joint Commission International (JCI) is renewed in January 2009, reaffirming the hospital's adherence to internationally benchmarked standards in patient safety and care.
• KKH is the first in Asia Pacific to use the next generation digital mammography system, MammoDiagnost DR
• The KKH Sleep Disorders Centre became the first sleep service in Asia to be accredited by the Thoraic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ) and the Australasian Sleep Association (ASA) in managing sleep disorders in children, on 27 February 2009
• KKH successfully rolled out the Closed Loop Medication Management (CLMM) system in July - a more efficient method of prescribing, administering and recording medication, bringing patient safety to a higher level.

2010

• The opening of the KK Hospital Simulation Centre enhances KKH’s medical training capabilities
• KKH receives re-certification for ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 in recognition of its pursuit to attain the best quality care and services that are consistent and continuously improved on.
• KKH receives three awards at the Asian Hospital Management Awards :
  - Excellence Award in Departmental Service Improvement for the "SMS service to patients with 'No evidence of cancer' resulting from mammography and cervical (PAP) smear screening"
  - Excellence Award in Internal Customer Service for the "Development and implementation of Hospital Risk Management System"
  - Excellence Award in Patient Safety Quality Medical Care for "In-patient Children Fall Prevention Measures in KKH".
• KKH CEO, Prof Ivy Ng, was conferred the International Management Action Award by the Chartered Management Institute on 15 Sep 2010. IMAA is an international award that recognises outstanding individuals who have demonstrated exceptional ability in taking management action to achieve sustainable, tangible results for an organisation, society or nation.
• KKH is re-certified as a pro-family organisation and accredited with the Businesses for Family Mark by the Businesses for Families Council (BFC).