The University of Maryland Children’s Hospital received a $50 million gift on Tuesday, the largest in the institution’s history. Leaders said the gift will expand the center’s clinical programs and research for therapy services.

Tom Golisano, an entrepreneur and philanthropist from New York, announced the donation at an event in Rochester, New York, which was also broadcast in the Baltimore children’s hospital.

In addition to the gift, the children’s hospital, which will be renamed the University of Maryland Golisano Children’s Hospital, will be joining a network of hospitals across the U.S. that will collaborate and share resources to elevate pediatric care.

Leaders in the medical center and the broader University of Maryland Medical System called the gift “historic and transformational.” Mohan Suntha, the CEO of the system, said the investment, along with joining the network, comes with the expectation that the hospital will share its best practices with other centers and improve health care across the country.

“It really does help set the bar of what is able to be accomplished when we deliver on the mission that we exist to serve,” he said.

Some of the money will go to expanding surgical capacity, launching a comprehensive pediatric gene therapy program, researching cellular therapy and treatment for sickle cell disease, Suntha said.

Dozens of pediatric leaders, clinicians and nurses crammed into the fifth floor’s Teen Room to watch Golisano’s speech. Monika Bauman, who has worked at the hospital for 36 years, teared up and hugged one of the nurses next to her.

A contribution of this magnitude will be a “game changer,” Bauman, the director of nursing, said. Part of the money will go into moving existing pediatric services into a unified space within the new Stoler Center for Advanced Medicine. The hospital currently has 90 beds, with more than 3,000 annual admissions and 118,000 outpatient visits.

Hospital leaders, including Bauman, said they hope the gift will be used to revamp the building’s physical spaces, including patient rooms and the equipment. The infrastructure will match modern medicine and a holistic approach to patient care, Bauman said. The Teen Room, for example, provides a sense of normalcy for teens who are hospitalized. Patients can hang out and play video games there.

“We do take care of patients with a variety of needs from all over and it takes a village,” she said. “It takes a lot of investment and infrastructure to do that.”

The hospital hasn’t been renovated for decades, said Jack Gladstein, the vice chair for pediatrics. The unit was designed with the patients in mind, but not necessarily their families. Having a parent in the room is part of the child’s therapy, Gladstein said, and he hopes the gift will allow the hospital to build such spaces for patients and their families.

“We’ve been providing excellent care,” Gladstein said, “This will allow us to do bigger and better and still offer excellent care, but do it in an environment that’s going to be much more pleasing for families.”