Sharp Prebys Innovation and Education Center May Save Many Lives

By Eva Trieger

SAN DIEGO – The Jewish Community Foundation prides itself on helping donors create a meaningful legacy. After all, our time here on earth is finite and relatively short, but we can live on in the generations that will succeed us. That same idea of continuity and opportunity were made evident as the JCF arranged for a group of us to visit the Sharp Prebys Innovation and Education Center.

The beautiful, unique campus is located in a state-of-the-art four-story building nestled  in Kearny Mesa. This type of training center has generally only been seen in university settings, but Sharp has created the largest simulation center in Southern California, to provide training to doctors and nurses in high-risk surgeries. This facility was “created not for profit, but for people.” The intention is to serve the entire San Diego community in all of their health care needs incorporating physical, mental, and behavioral health, with a “relentless commitment to the patient and the community.”

Over a beautiful lunch, Doctors Joe Bellezzo and  Maia Uli  and nurse Lori Moore shared stories of some of their memorable moments while being involved in the Envision project and the Sharp Prebys Innovation and Education Center.

A short video brought viewers into the perilous delivery of a 23-week-old fetus, as doctors skillfully placed a miniature CPAP machine on the tiny form and miraculously filled its lungs! Another doctor shared the case of a rescue with the ECMO machine that pulled a patient back from almost-certain death. The relating of life or death instances and the depth of compassion coupled with expert innovative care, left each of us wiping our eyes, shedding tears of joy and relief.

How did Sharp Hospital come into being?  Well, the legacy began four generations ago, following World War II.  Thomas Sharp, father of fallen serviceman, Donald N. Sharp, collaborated with a few dozen others who wanted to provide an expanding San Diego with a new hospital. They raised $500,000 and built the Donald N. Sharp Community Hospital, which opened in 1955.

Some30 years later, several other community hospitals joined together to create the largest healthcare provider for San Diego. Today the goals include medical innovation, patient experience, community health and clinical learning in neurosciences. Sharp has a superior record for treating high-risk pregnancies and deliveries, as well as other emergencies and traumas. This ten-year $2 billion dollar campaign relies on philanthropic donations. Some areas donors will impact include brain and spine disorders, cardiac and vascular surgeries, fetal medicine, mental health and emergency and trauma medicine.

Following our lunch, we were treated, and I do mean treated, to a tour of the simulation rooms of the Innovation and Education Center.  In these OR rooms doctors, nurses and students learn with actors and mannequins so that when they are faced with actual emergencies they can respond with skill and alacrity.

San Diego is indeed fortunate to be home to such a futuristic center and so many dedicated, committed doctors, nurses, CEOs and researchers.  I’m exceedingly grateful to our own Jewish Community Foundation for inviting me for this sneak peek of legacy building in action. While none of us wants to require emergency services, it is no small comfort to know that Sharp Prebys Innovation and Education Center is training their people to be supremely equipped should that need arise.

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Eva Trieger is a freelance writer based in San Diego County.