UC San Diego Health System Names Jacobs Medical Center Pavilion in Honor of Evelyn and Ernest Rady

Photos by Erik Jepsen/UC San Diego Publications

Pavilion for Women and Infants named in recognition of the Radys’ $12 million gift

“My father was an OB/GYN,” said Ernest Rady, one of San Diego’s most prominent philanthropists and business leaders. “When a woman would come in and say, ‘Thank you doctor, you saved my life,’ my father said it was like making a million dollars. He instilled in me the thought that helping others is fruitful.”

Helping others has been a decades-long tradition for Ernest Rady and his wife, Evelyn. Today, UC San Diego Health System announced the latest gift from these loyal campus supporters: the Radys committed $12 million to name the third and final specialty center at Jacobs Medical Center, which is scheduled to be completed in summer 2016. Named in the couple’s honor, the Rady Pavilion for Women and Infants will care for every kind of birth within a highly modern, technologically-advanced medical facility that includes a specialized neonatal intensive care unit.

“Jacobs Medical Center is part of the university’s investment in the future of health care for the entire region, and it will advance our goal of enriching human life and society,” said UC San Diego Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla. “With their latest act of generosity, Evelyn and Ernest Rady will help increase and enhance UC San Diego’s capacity as the regional hub for meeting the unique needs of mothers and infants.”

“We express deep gratitude to the Radys for this incredible gift,” said Paul Viviano, CEO, UC San Diego Health System. “The Rady Pavilion for Women and Infants will offer expanded services for all types of pregnancies, including those with high risk, as well as enhanced care for newborns who are born prematurely or need additional medical attention immediately after birth.”

Evelyn and Ernest Rady

Evelyn and Ernest Rady have a history of serving the local community’s most vulnerable members: children and infants. Rady Children’s Hospital carries their name, thanks to their philanthropy. And it is the couple’s wish that this gift to Jacobs Medical Center will help build and strengthen the collaboration among faculty at UC San Diego Health System, UC San Diego School of Medicine and Rady Children’s Hospital.

“Rady Children’s Hospital is a teaching hospital, and its affiliation with UC San Diego Health System is very important to the health of the community,” said Rady. “So I’m glad to have our name on two very special and unique facilities in San Diego that will help with the care of women and children.”

“We will take care of women of all ages and with any level of need,” said Dr. Charles Nager, interim chair of the department of reproductive medicine at the UC San Diego School of Medicine. “We’ve always provided great care for women and infants, but now we can expand the options with advanced technology and patient-centered care at Jacobs Medical Center.”

According to Nager, neonates born weighing less than three pounds have a survival rate of greater than 95 percent, ranking UC San Diego Health System among the top tier of hospitals in the nation. In addition, only about 17 percent of women giving birth for the first time have cesarean sections, and the rate of successful vaginal births after a cesarean is about 80 percent.

“Physicians and researchers at UC San Diego have collaborated to create and advance technologies to benefit our patients,” added Nager. “One example is epidermal electronics—wearable electronics that can be placed on an infant noninvasively to monitor anything from brain waves to skin perfusion.”

All eight labor and delivery rooms in the pavilion will be private, with—if needed—wireless fetal heart rate monitoring that will make it possible for women to walk around the room during labor. There will also be three large operating suites for cesarean deliveries, equipped with cameras and other equipment that can provide safe care for even the most complicated operative deliveries. Recovery will occur in one of 32 private postpartum rooms, each with a foldout bed for a family member, many with stunning views overlooking the Torrey Pines Mesa.

In addition, a three-room midwifery-staffed birth center, emphasizing a natural birth experience, is adjacent to labor and delivery, assuring that the most advanced medical equipment and multi-disciplinary expertise is moments away.

Women will also have access to advanced procedures that include non-invasive fetal genetics testing, fertility preservation for cancer patients, and early detection and treatment of preeclampsia.

The most premature and critically ill newborns will be cared for at a Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) in the new specialty center, equipped with innovations for monitoring infants’ health status non-invasively. Vital sign data will also be processed through a novel analytic system that identifies subtle cues—such as slight variations in heart rate—that may be an early indicator of infection, eye disease, lung or cardiovascular problems.

Inside Jacobs Medical Center

As the only academic health system in the region, UC San Diego Health System delivers outstanding patient care to the community through groundbreaking research and inspired teaching. Jacobs Medical Center is the largest hospital project in southern California. The $859-million facility will add 245 private beds to support highly specialized multi-disciplinary services for women and infants, advanced surgery and cancer care.

In addition to the Rady Pavilion for Women and Infants, which will be housed on floors 8-10 of the Jacobs Medical Center, the new facility will be home to two other specialty centers:

Floors 2-3: A. Vassiliadis Family Pavilion for Advanced Surgery

The A. Vassiliadis Family Pavilion for Advanced Surgery, thanks to a gift by local philanthropist Carol Vassiliadis, will offer access to more than 200 surgeons who specialize in complex procedures for all medical conditions. Examples of surgeries to be offered include MRI-guided gene therapy for brain cancer, heated intraperitoneal chemotherapy for abdominal cancers, and complex spine and joint reconstruction. A robust robotics program will continue to treat thyroid, esophageal, prostate, colon, kidney and bladder cancers. Delicate microsurgery to restore voice and hearing and reanimation of the paralyzed face and extremities will also be performed.

The pavilion will also house the region’s only intraoperative magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines. With this technology, surgeons will be able to image tumors in real-time during surgery to be certain that malignancies, such as glioblastoma in the brain, have been removed—without ever having to leave the operating room. MRI guidance can also be used for more accurate biopsies, for laser therapy to destroy tumors and to deliver gene therapy. The pavilion will be the only place in the United States using a proprietary MRI technique called Restriction Spectrum Imaging (RSI) to create color- coded maps of the brain for accurate surgery planning. The facility will also have 14 large 650-square-foot operating rooms to accommodate rapid changes in technology.

Floors 4-6: Pauline and Stanley Foster Pavilion for Cancer Care

A gift from Pauline Foster, community philanthropist and longtime supporter of UC San Diego, helped to fund the Pauline and Stanley Foster Pavilion for Cancer Care that will be home to medical staff specially trained in caring for the complex needs of patients with cancer. It will be the only in-patient facility of its kind in San Diego County, which has the fifth largest U.S. population, and where cancer is the No. 1 cause of death. With 108 dedicated beds, the pavilion will double UC San Diego Health System’s capacity to treat patients with every form of malignancy.

The pavilion will be the needed inpatient component to complement Moores Cancer Center at UC San Diego Health System, the first and only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center in San Diego and the only San Diego-based member of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. Most cancer patients are hospitalized at some point during their cancer journey. By virtue of their close proximity, the Foster Pavilion for Cancer Care and Moores Cancer Center can seamlessly align patient care by providing a familiar and healing environment, expert physicians and staff, and personalized cancer care with a continuum of services tailored to the needs of patients and their families, including treatment, clinical trials, nutrition, family support and other outpatient programs at Moores Cancer Center.

In addition their gift to the Jacobs Medical Center at UC San Diego Health System, Evelyn and Ernest Rady helped establish the university’s entrepreneurial business school—the Rady School of Management—among other campus initiatives. Ernest Rady is an active businessman and has founded and headed several San Diego companies. He founded Insurance Company of the West and Westcorp in 1971. In 2011, Rady formed American Assets Trust to succeed to the real estate business of American Assets, Inc., a privately held corporation founded in 1967 with over 40 years of experience in real estate management and development. Rady serves as the chief investment officer and managing member at American Assets Investment Management, LLC. He has also shared his business expertise through his role as chair of the Dean’s Advisory Council at the Rady School of Management.