I am honored to provide you an overview of the state of The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. This presentation will also be teleconference to the Regional Academic Health Center and also to the Texas Research Park. We really are trying to do everything possible to communicate with all avenues of our Health Science Center.
Over the past year, we have addressed many challenges together. We’ve taken advantage of many opportunities. We’ve expanded our educational mission, not only in San Antonio, but throughout South Texas now with the strong presence of Laredo and Edinburg and Harlingen.
We’ve unequivocally grown our research enterprise. We have more than $200 million in capital expenditures with building going on in San Antonio and throughout South Texas. And, we’re beginning to recruit and retain outstanding faculty members. But all this have been possible because of all of you. Very simply, this Health Science Center wouldn’t be where we are today without the strong leadership of our faculty, our staff, and the wonderful students we continue to attract to The Health Science Center at San Antonio. And because of that, it is a tremendous honor for me to continue to serve as your president.
What I’d like to accomplish today is to give you an overview of our many successes, to continue to provide you an overview of the challenges we face, and also, where we’re going over the next year. But before I give that overview, it’s always important to remember where we came from.
A little less than 50 years ago, in 1959, through strong community support and through courageous leaders in our Texas legislature, our legislative system authorized the Board Regents to establish a medical school in San Antonio. Now there were strong critics at the time and people were asking: why establish a medical school in San Antonio? Kind of similar sentiments have been asked about why establish a presence in the Regional Academic Health Center in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Very simply, it is the right thing to do. I think that if anyone was to question in 1959 the [establishment of] the medical school in San Antonio, no one could ever second guess that wisdom, because what has happened over less than 50 years is that this farm, these pastures, have been transformed into the preeminent research and health university not only in San Antonio but throughout South Texas.
And in fact, because of this transformation, the biosciences are the leading economic, impact industry in the City of San Antonio and in the region. I also predict that with a presence in the Lower Rio Grande Valley that we’ll have an equal economic impact in that region over the next 30 years. But again, this is possible not because of just bricks and mortar. It’s possible because of individuals like yourself.
The Health Science Center has grown tremendously since 1959 because of our faculty and our staff. It has been able to expand its clinical venues because of leadership through the university hospital system and the Veterans Administration. The Veterans Administration remains a very strong partner in continuing to support biomedical research at this health science center. In 1973, as a result of this, as a result of expanding from one medical school to five schools that are in this academic health center, our name has changed to The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, but our mission has never been stronger—not only to serve San Antonio, but to serve South Texas in education, in clinical care and in the biosciences.
What is the impact of The Health Science Center not only to San Antonio, but throughout South Texas?
We educate more that 2,700 students each year. And what a great pleasure it is for me to be able to walk the halls and see many of these students, because I know firsthand that many of these students will practice their professional degree, their professional education here in South Texas. Many of these students will also maybe be inspired to become academic [leaders.] We provide more than $70 million in uncollected indigent care and $20 million is actual expense out of our practice plan. And we’ll talk a little bit more about that. Our research enterprise has grown significantly over the past three years to the point where we have more than $153 million in sponsored-research care here. And to our legislators this is significant, because most of the research that we do is actually affecting the population that we serve—diabetes, cardiovascular disease, malignancies and other very important health concerns. So, very simply, our success is very critical to South Texas. And because South Texas is the region that is growing more rapidly than any other region in the state, our success is also critically important to the well-being and the health of the entire State of Texas.
Now let’s talk about new projects that are completed, near completion and also projects in the horizon.
The first building, which is almost halfway completed, is the Children’s Cancer Research Institute. This is made possible, as you know, due to the tobacco settlement endowment fund or the tobacco settlement. We received out of that tobacco settlement $200 million. What a tremendous gift to this city, to the The Health Science Center, and to the children that we will serve. And through the leadership of Dr. Celia Kaye, the department of pediatrics, and Tony Infante, the [medical] dean’s office, we were able to establish a platform to recruit an outstanding pediatric oncology scientist by the name of Dr. Sharon Murphy. I have every confidence in the world that over the next several years as the Children’s Cancer Research Institute becomes fully operational it has the potential of bringing in more than $50 million in federally funded grants over the future. So I’m extremely optimistic about what the Children’s Cancer Research Institute will do for this Health Science Center, for the state and for the nation.
The Regional Academic Health Center, its medical education division, opened in June 2002. This building is providing the opportunity for 48 of our medical students to have an experience with a standard of excellence equal to our [main campus’]medical school, because it is the same medical school in Harlingen. We have the opportunity to have concentrations in the areas of primary care and public health. This building and its presence is already having an economic impact to the region. For example, Valley Baptist has already invested a tremendous amount of dollars to be able to construct a brand new pediatric ward, a pediatric ICU for the benefit of our students. Su Clinica Familiar has rebuilt their entire clinic that serves a lot of the underfunded patients in that region, but also serves as a very important ambulatory care center for our students. Steve Wartman and I actually had the opportunity to visit Su Clinica Familiar last week, and it really is an outstanding clinical site. In addition, this campus is already beginning to attract partners—partners like the Veterans Administration—who have interest in providing a presence in that region and as you know, they strongly support the biosciences. And there’s a potential for developing a clinical research center very similar to [the one ]that is present at the Veterans Administration Hospital here in San Antonio.
The Edinburg Campus. We will actually be having the groundbreaking ceremony in about a week. This campus is also critical to the education of our students. We can’t educate medical students just with pathophysiology; they have to also be exposed to the biosciences. That’s the purpose of actually having a research division of the Regional Academic Health Center. This campus will actually be in the heart of The University of Texas Pan Am campus. It will provide an opportunity for our faculty to interact with academic faculty at that university. And it will provide new research base to actually address themes that are also affecting the populations of the U.S.-Texas/Mexico border region.
In addition to these two campuses that I just mentioned, the medical education component has actually received $1.5 million in scholarships over the past year through several foundations. The City of Edinburg has already given us $1 million to help support the research campus of the Regional Academic Health Center.
The Laredo campus will have its opening day ceremony next week, and we’ll talk a little bit more about this campus. The Sam and Ann Barshop Center for Longevity and Aging Studies will have a groundbreaking this February. This has been made possible through the success of scientists across all five schools. In fact, our aging research group actually brings in more grants than any other aging research group in this nation. And because of [this federal research grant] success, [it] has [translated] to [even further] philanthropic success, because Sam and Ann Barshop have provided us with a $4 million gift to be able to establish this Center.
I’m extremely proud of the leadership of all five schools. I’m also extremely proud of the leadership that Dr. Arlan Richardson has [provided] [transform] this dream [into]] reality.
The Student Services Administration Building is going to happen. I think you can see it beginning the transformation of the landscape where the Student Services Administration Building will actually reside. This building will actually address some of the issues that the LCME provided this institution during their last cycle. They’ve identified the fact that we don’t have enough small class room sizes, for small classrooms to be able to educate our students. Well, this building will address that problem. This building will also provide clinical simulation sites not only for our medical students, but for students across all five schools. The Center will also be providing us opportunities to work with the Veterans Administration and with the Center for Public Health Preparedness to be able to capture Department of Defense funding which [Dr.] Harold Timboe is actually working on at a tremendous pace. And it will also have offices for academic administration, offices for an expanding development office, as well as the executive offices. This will be a beautiful building for this central campus.
As we’re growing, we experience growing pains, but also pains that we didn’t expect. Let me talk to you about a couple of challenges that we’re identifying and that we’re experiencing.
Deferred maintenance has actually been deferred for quite some time. I think that all of us can actually experience some of the issues that happen when we have a campus that is now exceeding 30 years old—the central campus. We’ve had some significant rainstorms. We’ve had leaky roofs. We’ve had cracking walkways and sidewalks. We really need to develop a funding stream to be able to address deferred maintenance. So Mr. Steve Lynch and I are beginning to work on that. We’re also beginning to identify Permanent University Funds though part of our safety program to address some of these problems.
This Health Science Center has actually experienced several unfunded mandates, and because of that, this remains a top legislative priority for me to be able to get funds to adequately support campuses that we oversee throughout South Texas and also in San Antonio.
One of the biggest challenges that we experience, at least when I walk into this Health Science Center, has been the challenge of the medical practice plan. When I came on board, we were addressing a deficit of about $14.5 million for the practice plan of October of 2000. This was projected to grow to $16.9 million. But all of you took immediate action to reverse this trend. This came from hard work from the faculty, from our department chairs, from the leadership of UPG with Tom Mayes and Bob Payne and through the leadership of the dean’s office Celia Kaye and Steve Wartman as well as Steve Lynch. Because everyone stepped up to the plate, we were able to enhance revenues like never before. We were able to do this by optimizing billings and collections, by diminishing overhead and trying to constantly expand on clinical venues. The bottom line is that we were able to increase revenues for the MSRDP from $76 million in FY 00 to $109 million in FY 02. This is a tremendous accomplishment—an accomplishment that [is just one example for why I am ]grateful for the leadership of this school.
The end result of this is that we have been able to improve the net operating margins for the practice plan over the past three years. In FY 00, we had a $14.5 million deficit in an operating margin. In FY 01, through your hard work, this was reduced to a $3 million deficit. And for the first time in five years, we’ve had a positive operating margin in the practice plan. This is an extremely important step to improve the well-being of this Health Science Center. I feel very strongly that as the practice plan has a positive operating margin, it’s also extremely important to reward our faculty who are working so hard. And because of that, we feel it extremely important to continue to provide productivity-based compensation, performance based compensation, to the clinical faculty who are working so hard. I’ve been a faculty member before in the past, and I also know how important this is to continue to grow our clinical enterprise. The net assets as a result of all the hard work that you all provided, has resulted in an increase in the net assets of the practice plan from $21 million to $36 million over the past few years.
We can’t ignore the importance of the dental practice plan. Our dental school remains among one of the five top dental schools in this nation. And the clinical program at the dental school has been spectacular to say the least. It not only addresses many of our unfunded and underfunded patients, but this clinic also has been able to recruit patients from community leaders to chancellors and to board of regents. Dr. Kalkwarf, I’ve very proud of everything you’ve done for our dental practice plan. The net operating results of the dental practice plan continue to be a positive operating state. The net bottom line is that if we have a positive operating margin in our dental practice plan, we also improve the number of unrestricted dollars we have to invest in new clinical programs and in recruitment and retention of our star faculty. The net assets of DSRDP also continue to grow—from $6.5 million in FY 00 to $8 million in FY 02.
I think everyone knows how important I view excellence in clinical programs. I can’t help it. It’s been a part of my heritage for three generations. It is still an avenue that I feel passionately about. In order for us to have a top academic health center, I’ve always stated you have to have excellence in clinical programs and excellence in research programs. Let me just touch upon a few.
I’ve very proud to say that this year, Dr. Halff’s Transplant Program, the division of transplantation, broke the barrier in becoming one of the top 10 transplant programs in this nation. I’m extremely proud of his leadership and his team, which is Dr. Robert Esterl, Dr. Ken Washburn and Dr. Greg Abrahamian. And I want to thank you for still allowing me to participate in their transplant program. This year, this liver transplant program will exceed more than 125 different transplants in one year. Now, this transplant program also needs to excel in its scientific endeavors. And I think that if we’re able to balance that out, we’ll have a transplant program that is internationally recognized.
Bankole Johnson has been exemplary in being able to establish an outstanding alcohol and drug research addiction program. He’s been able to attract patients from all over the United States and also experiencing great success in philanthropy.
Ian Thompson’s program on prostate cancer is one that I’m extremely proud of. He’s also been recruiting patients throughout this nation, is head of one of the largest trials in screening for prostate cancer, and also, I [have] every confidence in the world that he can [compete] with programs such as Johns Hopkins and other top programs in this nation.
Just as serious as I am about centers of excellence in the clinical arena, I am absolutely committed to continuing to grow the research enterprise at this Health Science Center. Now, as we reflect back as to where we’ve been over the past five years, [we] can feel confident that we are continuing to grow the research enterprise. Areas such as addition, which Charles Bowden has set the foundation for, and which Bankole Johnson has had the ability to recruit an outstanding group such as that of Dr. Min Lee, has been—extremely successful in [securing] NIH Awards. Our cancer program continues to grow. I [have] every confidence with the leadership of Geoffrey Wise, Wen Hwa Lee, [and] Sharon Murphy that we will continue to excel in this arena. Our aging program, I’ve already commented upon. The successes that we have in cardiothoracic and heart disease—with the work that Greg Freeman is doing and the work [of] Steven Bailey and Julio Palmaz in developing a new rendition of the Palmaz stent, is extremely exciting. We are also very strong in diabetes and bone disease.
Let’s talk about where we’ve been in NIH awards, because this is where it actually speaks to the success and the quality of science at our health science center. These [federal]funds, as you know, are peer reviewed, and actually speaks of the quality of our scientists. {As}we continue to grow, the NIH awards to this health science center since FY 00 have [increased] from $62-, to $66-, to $73 million over the past 30 years. Our NIH ranking has improved over the past year from 47 to 46. [Ours is] a relatively young academic health center. Forty-six out of 125 is not bad for a health science center that’s less than 50 years of age. And [among] the UT health components, we are second [next to] Southwestern Medical School. But, we must continue to [strengthen] this research enterprise with a lot of emphasis, developing strategies enhance the research enterprise at [our] Health Science Center.
Research expenditures are a more accurate assessment of research being done on a year-to-year basis. This graphic demonstrates that the research enterprise continues to grow. The indirect cost recovery rate [is one] we still need to renegotiate with the federal government. We’ve been able to [increase] the indirect cost recovery from $16 million to $22 million over the past few years [for]two reasons. [The first] is the growth in the research enterprise and [the second] is that Steve Lynch and Jane Youngers were able to renegotiate our indirect cost recovery rate from 44.5 to about 46 percent. And we will constantly renegotiate this so we [more closely approach] our peer institutions, which [receive about] 50 percent indirect cost recovery rate. We have an opportunity to negotiate almost every year and a half.
I’m very proud about the Presidential Research Enhancement Fund that we established last year. This is to promote disciplinary research. It also provides an opportunity to recruit many of our scientific leaders to develop strategies on how we as an institution can better succeed in the research enterprise. I’ve also, through the Presidential Research Enhancement Fund and through the research of the executive leadership committee, we’re also developing ways [to provide tangible incentives] in the scientific arena. I want to thank every member of the executive research committee, and I want to thank Dr. Brian Herman for chairing this important research committee.
Education is also an extremely, if not the most, important mission that we have at The Health Science Center. This is really what our founding fathers envisioned us to be able to provide -- outstanding education for our students not only for South Texas, but for students [who graduate to work and serve throughout] this nation.
This past year we began the Presidential Distinguished Lecture Series. And the purpose of this is to be able to stimulate our students to continue to excel. I was very proud to have Dr. Judah Folkman provide the inaugural lectureship. And Judy Wolf, thank you very much for really providing a venue. Actually Judah spoke to me about a month ago that it was one the greatest experiences that he’s had over the past decade. And I had a great smile just seeing the students interact with Judah Folkman. It was a great success.
The Regional Academic Health Center will provide enhanced experiences for our students. Again, I stated that, this will provide strengths in the areas of primary care and public health making this different than many of the other academic health centers [to which] students apply.
The Laredo Extension Campus has the opportunity to excel in allied health programs: respiratory therapy, clinical laboratory sciences, EMT, provides a venue for Claudia Miller’s STEER Program to continue to excel in that region. And, this is an important site for some of the initiatives [that] Dr. Harold Timboe has in regards to the new Center for Public Health Preparedness.
In the past year and a half, we’ve grown from one to three Hispanic Centers of Excellence. This is extremely important, because we serve a region that is predominantly Hispanic. As you go towards the border, this increases to about 80 percent. To become a Hispanic Centers of Excellence, it’s not just about enrollment, but there needs to be a real budgetary commitment to recruit, to retain students, [and] to continue to recruit outstanding faculty of diverse backgrounds.
I’m very, very proud of [the] students at each school [of our] Health Science Center. Each year it is my privilege to be able to honor some of these students through a presidential ambassadorship. And these students have been really outstanding over the past year representing this health science center on many fronts.
Educational excellence is present in all five schools at this academic health center.
The dental school has provided more AADR research fellowships than any other dental school in this nation. Two of our dental students became national finalists in a very stiff competition. Several dental students were awarded, or became finalists in the Warner Lambert Hatton competition. Jennifer Gibbs was given a presidential award for excellence in dental research. Amy James was elected secretary of the AADR research group. Ryan Green was appointed regional representative for the AADR national student research group. [These are just] a few examples of what is going on in dental education here at The Health Science Center.
The medical school has also been extremely successful in allowing medical students to become fellows in the Howard Hughes Medical Institute—extremely competitive. And Steve, and members of your office, I’m extremely proud of the opportunities you’re providing to our medical students. Naden Preston also became the representative for the AAMA Women’s Physician Congress. Traci Angelica became the TMA student for the year as a regional delegate for the AMA house of delegates. Our students are nationally recognized.
In the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Lisa Whitson was awarded the Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship for Minorities—also, another extremely competitive award.
In the School of Allied Health [Sciences],Melissa Nedry was appointed the chairman for the American Society of Clinical Laboratory Science. Martina Gallagher received an NIH Research Service Award.
Christina Cardenas Leal from the School of Nursing was awarded a fellowship supported by the American Nurses Association.
To every dean who’s present here today, thank you for your leadership and for providing the faculty who educate our students.
Well, all of this is only possible by continually attracting the finest and retaining the finest faculty at [our] Health Science Center. This is a competitive market. Every time we get national recognition, other institutions, other academic health centers, are recruiting our top talent. And it takes resources to recruit and to retain and therefore, it is extremely important that we continually identify resources to be able to accomplish this goal.
In the executive committee, we’ve recruited three outstanding members [of whom] I [am] extremely proud.
Let me first begin with Armando Diaz who we recruited a little less than six months ago. Armando is now our Vice President for Governmental Relations. He’s got a tremendous amount of experience: [first], as a legislative staff member for two previous senators of our state, [second, he worked] in the UT System office for over 10 years, and [third, he’s making [his] presence [here count for] every school here in [our] academic health center.
Harold Timboe, again, a graduate of our medical school here at The Health Science Center, [former] commander at BAMC, [former] commander at Walter Reed, and he chose to come back to San Antonio to be able to continue to enhance the mission of The Health Science Center. He has] significant leadership [experience] working with our military hospitals, the Veterans [Administration] hospital [here] and also with establishing the Center for Public Health Preparedness [and Biomedical Research]. Harold, I’m extremely proud of you.
And Merle Oson. I’m extremely delighted to have been able to appoint him as the dean of the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. He[presented] his vision to the Executive Committee not long ago. We’re extremely proud of the great work that Merle is doing.
In the Medical School, [we have secured] three outstanding recruits [during] the past year. Sharon Murphy is our most recent recruit [to] The Health Science Center. No one can be more proud than I am [of] her selection, for her wanting to come to our health science center and be a part of the Children’s Cancer Research Institute. We have a real gem in her spirit.
Abraham Verghese has already been welcomed by this entire community. He gave a lecture at the President’s Council luncheon. He embraces the entire community. In return, [it] provid[es] philanthropic support to your center, Abraham. I think this past Sunday you had an article in The New York Times. So, [I believe that] very, very quickly, the Center of Humanity and Medical Ethics at this health science center will be[come] one of the leading [national] centers in this [field]. And, it’s [all] possible through your leadership and through the support of the dean’s office.
Brad Pollock has become a great friend of mine over the past year. He’s a very good friend of one of my mentors at Hopkins by the name of Dr. Charles Thaddus, but I think all of us have benefited from his expertise at this health science center.
So yes, we continue to recruit and retain outstanding faculty at [our] health science center. These are but a few examples.
In the Nursing School, we’ve been able to recruit Kathy Lucke, Carol Reineck and Sharon Lewis in the department of acute nursing care.
In the Dental School, three wonderful recruits over the past year and a half. Lily Garcia came back home from her [assignment] at The University of Colorado to be[come] the chairman of the department of prosthodontics. Martin Thornhill was recruited from England, and we’re extremely proud of his leadership and his research interests in diagnostic sciences. Rosie Roldan was recruited for the department of pediatric dentistry. I’m sure she’ll play a very important role in the Ricardo Salinas Clinic as we get that off the ground over the next year.
In the School of Allied Health Sciences there are three wonderful recruits: Dr. Debra Perrett, Dennis Blessing and Ron Holton — enhancing educational clinical laboratory sciences, and the department of physician assistant studies.
What are some of the priorities that we are going to face this coming year? I think all of you know that this is going to be a legislative session. We’re coming into the 78th legislative session beginning in January. So, I want to take this opportunity to provide you [with] an overview of some of the legislative priorities that we are asking our delegation, not only the Bexar County delegation, but the entire South Texas delegation to support. One of the advantages of having campuses in Laredo, Edinburg and Harlingen is that [we] have many legislat[ors] who understand [our] needs.
The first [need] that we’re going to address is to have our legislators [enhance] formula funding as recommended by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. It’s through formula funding that we are able to provide the size, the scope, the quality of programs that we have. It provides a tremendous amount of revenue to support the salaries of our faculty and our staff and by [honoring] this new recommendation [of] the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, [the legislature would] actually increase dollars for research enhancement.
[Regarding] special item requests:. The[se] are items outside the base budget for The Health Science Center. [Our] top four [special items] are programs that The Health Science Center has ongoing. And the last two are new programs. We’ll talk about these in a little more detail.
The Regional Academic Health Center [received] $9 million in funding over the previous biennium. This [was] sufficient funding to be able to begin a medical education component, but it’s not enough to be able to expand operational funds for the research component of the RAHC. And that’s the reason why we’re requesting an increase of $20 million, [for a] total [RAHC] request of $29.1 million.
The South Texas Border Region Initiatives are fund[s] that provide a tremendous amount of funding [support] for cooperative programs — [such as:] K-16 programs, supporting high school career opportunity programs, HCOP, collaborative facilitated admissions with other institutions of higher education—addressing many of our needs throughout South Texas. We’re requesting an increase of $1 million, predominantly to benefit the Alamo Area district. And through these funds, we’ll be able to leverage some of the funds that the City of San Antonio’s has provided to be able to support the Ricardo Salinas Clinic which [Dental Dean] Ken Kalkwarf has educat[ed] our city councilmen about, and has convinced the City to provide resources for that very important clinic.
The Laredo Extension Campus will now be fully operational; we’re requesting an increase in funding in that area.
Outreach support for regional programs is also extremely important, because The Health Science Center needs to be able to have resources to be able to provide individuals for grants management—all the oversight it takes to oversee South Texas programs apart from what we have with the Regional Academic Health Center.
There are two new programs I’d like to talk a little bit to you about. The San Antonio Life Science Institute is a bill that passed during the last legislative session, but it was not funded. This provides an opportunity to find resources to be able to develop joint degree programs with UTSA as well as joint research programs. This is a very high priority for the Board of Regents as well as our new chancellor. Our board is trying to facilitate ways of working together collaboratively between academic and health components. This is an area that this current Board of Regents is actually asking all the presidents and all the faculty of academic health components to [support.] This [cooperation may] provide a funding stream [in the future] to be able to facilitate [this Institute.] If have money on the table, it’s always a lot easier to collaborate.
Our research enhancement is extremely important for this health science center. Our argument is that it is through research we provide the catalyst for the bioscience industry to be[come] a leading economic [engine for our] city. But we need to be able to find new [revenue] streams to be able to recruit new scientists. We need to be able to provide operational funds for core research laboratories. And, we need to be able to provide [additional monies for our ] centers which exhibit great success.
I want to continue to work with the Faculty Senate to encourage faculty development. I want to thank Judy Teale’s and Karin Barnes’ leadership on the Faculty Senate. We want to recruit an outstanding dean for the School of Nursing.
I’m still extremely interested in recruiting a Vice President for Research. Over the next couple of months, I will be asking [for nominees and suggestions] from our scientific leaders of this health science center. [We want to] identify an individual who [will work tirelessly with me] to [further resource and strengthen our] research success. [Also,] this individual will have to work very closely with our deans and the executive research committee. We have major issues with research integrity and compliance that every academic health center is facing. We’re asked to develop new partnerships throughout the region. I believe that [the new VP for Research will be critical to the future success of] our health science center.
I will continue to support the presidential research excellence funding. We were able to increase the amount of funding by an additional $500,000 this year. The executive research committee [now] has $1.5 million to promote interdisciplinary research.
We need to continue strengthening our partnerships with all institutions of higher education in this region. I am looking for avenues to be able to provide operational funds for these very important core research laboratories that are critical to the success of our research initiatives.
We are in the process of establishing a Center for Public Health Preparedness. There [may be] a lot of federal money available through the Department of Defense and President Bush’s [other] initiatives in this area. We want to [take] a leading role in this arena, because we [are already provide Homeland Security medical response expertise] in San Antonio that [qualifies us and makes us] competitive for new federal dollars.
Developing a trauma institute is an important initiative to [pursue.] Celia Kaye has [assumed] a very important role working with our military hospitals, our VA [partners] and the University Hospital System to identify new funding streams to [better] support trauma. What I’ve learned over the past year is that the burden of trauma is extreme for many departments in our clinical area of The Health Science Center. For example, this has been a great strain for the department of orthopedics, and it’s been an even greater strain for the division of neurosurgery. We must change the way we are [supporting] trauma in order for us to succeed. The division of neurosurgery has experienced great attrition over the past year, because the burden of trauma prevents them from being able to expand their clinical practice toward sub specialty areas — the reason why neurosurgeons became neurosurgeons. They didn’t become neurosurgeons just to take care of trauma [patients]. I feel it’s extremely important to increase the presence of neurosurgery at this health science center, which reports to the Office of the Medical Dean. Working with Steve Wartman and Celia Kaye, and the leadership of Dennis Vollmer, as well as now Jim Story, we’re committed to establishing a center of the neurosurgical sciences with a very strong commitment to make this a department as well — critical to the well being of this Health Science Center. Neurosurgery affects every walk of life. It affects pediatrics. It affects endocrinology. It affects many walks of our clinical venue. It’s also very critical to preserve the neurosurgical residency. I’m extremely committed and this administration is committed to help this succeed.
Mario Ramirez is expanding the Med Ed Program in Laredo. The Med Ed Program has been extremely helpful. It’s actually funded through the STBI to recruit more [student] applicants from South Texas than ever before, [and never have] there been more medical students from South Texas entering academic health centers than this previous year.
We’re [now] recruiting a chief executive officer for the University’s Physician Groups. I think that we are in a good position right now to be able to recruit an outstanding leader. Through the work of Tom Mayes, Bob Payne, Celia Kaye, Steve Wartman and Steve Lynch, and all of you, we have a positive operating margin. We need credibility in UPG, and I think we [will] recruit an outstanding individual to take us to the next level.
Philanthropy has also been extremely successful over the past three years. In fiscal year 01, we had the most successful philanthropic year in the history of this health science center with $33 million in cash actually entering The Health Science Center in gifts. If you add pledges it increases to about $55 million in that one year. At the close of fiscal year 02 we received $30 million in cash to address science and clinical venues The Health Science Center. Judy Wolf, I think that’s a remarkable accomplishment [of yours, especially] in an economy that’s actually been close to recession. We’ve had success in major gifts in the past year.
Fundraising [here is especially impressive] compared to other [peer] institutions [because] we’ve been able to do this with a small staff, therefore [incurring only] a small overhead. Judy Wolf and Mike Crosby and their staff have been able to accomplish this and are continuing to grow. We need to do everything in our power to decrease our dependency on the state. And therefore, the practice plan, our research enterprise, our development campaign, [all] need to be at full throttle, all the time.
The President’s Council membership has nearly doubled over the past two years. These are unrestricted dollars that we give back to all five schools at The Health Science Center. Just three weeks ago, we were able to give more money back to each school than ever before as a result of many of our new Council members. I’m very, very proud of this.
We have launched a [major gifts initiative] with a goal to raise $300 million over the next five years to [strengthen significantly our] research enterprise. We [will] raise $200 million [or more] from the private sector and [then] leverage these [private gifts] with a match from the Permanent University Fund, with tuition revenue bonds and with other federal funds [to reach our overall goal]. The purpose is to obtain operational funding and [establish] research excellence [endowments] of about $150 million [for academic] chairs, distinguished chairs, professorships, [and for] everything [else] that it takes to retain and recruit outstanding [academic and research] leaders.
$100 million [from the Initiative]will be used to [build] a biomedical research building here [near] the central campus [and adjacent to the North Campus, close to] where the Children’s Cancer Research Institute is. The fact of the matter is that many of our laboratories here on the central campus our out-dated; we really need plan [now] for the future. We’ve presented this plan for the Board of Regents’ [approval]. They’ve given us planning authority and [our] Development Board [of volunteer supporters] fully endorsed this Initiative. We’ve started working on this at great speed.
A request for $300 million may sound like a lot for a region like South Texas, but it really is a moderate amount compared to many academic health centers that this nation has. For example, these schools are going on capital campaigns exceeding $1 billion. This is really the first time that we have a capital campaign of this amount in the history of The Health Science Center.
This is where we were in the past. This is where we are currently. This doesn’t even address the campuses that we have in the Regional Academic Health Center, the North Campus and the Texas Research Park. {Within the next] five years, [we want to further strengthen] our research enterprise and also establish an area where we can provide applications and the science to take [even better] care of our patients.
So, this where’ve we been, where we are, [and] where we’re going. We’ve had challenges. We’ve had opportunities. We’re continuing to grow. It gives me great pleasure to give you this overview today, and I want to personally thank each and every one of you for making this health science center great, and for making it such a great joy for me to be able to serve as your president. You provide me the energy to be able to do what I do, to be able to speak with our legislators and to be able to [communicate] your successes to our community so we can actually excel in our [ongoing] development campaign.
So, thank you very much.