South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
UCF, HCA break ground on teaching hospital in Lake Nona
It was on Oct. 3, 2007, that Dr. Deborah German donned a construction hat, grabbed a shovel and broke ground at an empty field in a corner of Lake Nona’s Medical City, kicking off the construction of the UCF College of Medicine.
Today, that medical school has trained 490 future doctors, and now some of those students will get a chance to learn their craft at yet another new building in Medical City: A new teaching hospital perched next to the medical school.
On Thursday, German once again put on a white construction hat, grabbed a shovel with a golden blade and ceremoniously dug into a pile of dirt at a large field of grass that will become UCF Lake Nona Medical Center by late 2020.
“This was a critical missing piece to our puzzle,” said German, founding dean of UCF College of Medicine.
Establishing this teaching hospital has been part of German’s vision to create a premier medical school in Orlando.
“It took a little longer than I had hoped, but a lot shorter than I had feared and we found just the right partner,” she said.
Earlier this year, UCF inked a deal with HCA Healthcare, a large national hospital chain, to establish the teaching hospital.
HCA North Florida is building the $175 million teaching hospital and will have 80 percent equity in it.
UCF is providing the land and its brand, with a 20 percent equity.
Wendy Brandon, the current CEO of Central Florida Regional Hospital, was named the CEO of the new hospital in September.
HCA officials are projecting that the 64-bed hospital will have a total operating revenue of $71 million in its first year, which will gradually increase to $89 million by its fifth year.
“It's the fulfillment of a life’s dream,” said former UCF President John Hitt, who attended the ceremony before heading to his new home in Wisconsin. “This is a wonderful development, not just for UCF but for all of Central Florida and all of Florida. We hope with the development of further research, we can have a worldwide impact.”
Having a new hospital in Lake Nona and in partnership with the medical school holds varying kinds of promise for those who attended the ground-
breaking ceremony.
For Dr. Kiminobu Sugaya, a neurobiologist and founder of SynapCyte, a biotech company that’s developing a drug that targets the stem cells to treat neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer’s, it represents the opportunity for clinical trials.
“This is wonderful. We needed one,” he said.
For Dr. Abdo Asmar, the new hospital elevates the status of the medical school.
“This is really a dream come true,” said Asmar, program director for internal medicine and vice chair for graduate medical education at UCF College of Medicine. “Everybody that wants to come to UCF, now you can tell them that there's a teaching hospital.”
And for medical students, who dotted the field of attendees with their short white coats, it is the sheer excitement of having a hospital of their own.
“We'll be the first class to have the majority of our medical training there,” said Stephanie Erickson, a firstyear medical student. “I think it's nice what they have going on now and they can rotate you through different hospitals, but it'll be a lot more convenient for us to be able to stay in Lake Nona and not have to travel as far downtown and deal with the traffic as much.”
“I think this is amazing,” said Oriana Fermin, another first-year medical student. “That's part of the reason I chose to go to this school. It's because I feel like it's groundbreaking in all senses.”
HCA also announced on Thursday a $3 million gift to hire a renowned cancer scientist to lead UCF’s cancer efforts.
“The endowed eminent scholar in oncology chair will allow us to start from the very beginning with a nationally recognized expert who will bring together the research, which means the approach to tomorrow's cures, right here in our center as we build it,” said German.
UCF is establishing a cancer research and treatment facility in a nearby building with several partners, including HCA’s Sarah Cannon Cancer Institute. Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute, which has called the building home for more than a decade, is leaving Orlando by the end of November.