In 2022 a $25 million donation from the Ginsburg Family Foundation established the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity at Nemours Children’s Health. The Institute represents a first-of-its-kind initiative to advance health equity for children in medically underserved areas by partnering with communities and codifying evidenced-based approaches that are effective, scalable and transferable. This week’s guests Nancy Molello and Marc McMurrin highlight the work they have accomplished in this area as well as the Institute’s future.
Learn more about the Ginsburg Institute.
Guests:
Nancy Molello, MSB, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity at Nemours Children’s Health
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation
Host/Producer: Carol Vassar
EPISODE 63 TRANSCRIPT
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Welcome to Well Beyond Medicine, the Nemours Children’s Health Podcast. Each week, we’ll explore anything and everything related to the 80% of child health impacts that occur outside the doctor’s office. I’m your host, Carol Vassar, and now that you are here, let’s go.
MUSIC:
Well Beyond Medicine
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
Our aspirational vision is to have the healthiest children in the state of Florida, and that the models that we create will be able to spread across the country and across the world. And I think Florida’s a great place to start.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
That’s the voice of Nancy Molello, Executive Director of the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity at Nemours Children’s Health. Established in 2022 with a $25 million donation from the Ginsburg Family Foundation, the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity is a first-of-its-kind initiative, advancing health equity for children in medically underserved communities by partnering with communities and codifying evidence-based approaches to Children’s Health Equity that are effective, scalable, and transferable. They also aim to nurture a new generation of health professionals in the practices of health equity through the Ginsburg Scholars Program, which we’ll hear more about in a separate podcast episode. With us to discuss the origins, efforts and future of the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity is Nancy Molello, along with Marc McMurrin, President and CEO of the Ginsburg Family Foundation, which is named after Alan H. Ginsburg, a well-known Florida businessman and philanthropist. As Marc takes a moment to tell us.
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
Alan is an inspiring leader in this community, and I’m privileged to be able to work with him over the last six years. Alan made his wealth through real estate development and multifamily housing primarily and always has been a community person, knowing that where he made his money, he wanted to reinvest that money back into the community. Now, Alan’s portfolio of real estate is beyond Central Florida, but this is where he calls home. And so Alan has been a person that has been very focused on how to be able to make those impactful investments that create sustainability to benefit the community and for Nemours when it came to children, knowing that this was the right place to make those kinds of investments.
So Alan is philanthropic and focuses of healthcare, education, arts, and culture, and human rights initiatives. Those may sound broad, but we’re very specific in those areas of how we want to make impact based on the circumstances of the day. So you’ll find Alan, humorous, joyful, sharp, generous, and wants to pave a better future for those that are coming after him. And so he’s a man that inspires me, inspires many in this community.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
And generous is an apt word considering that he gave $25 million to establish in 2022, the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity. And that is among many donations that the foundation has made in the healthcare space. Talk about the value your organization and Mr. Ginsburg see in this kind of philanthropy.
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
Well, it’s interesting. When we were first approached by Nemours, it was a big ask. And for the family to consider that, there was consideration of first health equity, okay, we get that. We want to help fund that. Why Nemours? Because we funded Mayo Clinic and a lot of research. We’ve also funded Advent Health here in Central Florida, a large community system of healthcare. But for children, Nemours made more sense the more we learned. I can tell you that what we discovered that the DNA of Nemours is just very different, that we learned through that process, and why this gift became so significant for us was because it is a model where it’s focused not on just how do we take care of those that are in the hospital, but how do we help those children so they never step into the door.
But that allows them philanthropy to move outside the doors to help make sure that those children don’t have to get sick or get treated well beforehand, especially in minority communities that don’t have adequate healthcare. And our investment in partnership with Nemours could be more powerful because of the unique DNA that Nemours has, not only as a well-respected children’s hospital but in its mindset of how it meets the needs of the community.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Marc, what were some of the conditions, if you will, for making this gift to Nemours?
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
There were a couple of factors that were really important to us that Dr. Moss and his team laid out. Some things we were inspired by, not only, of course, by the overall vision of Children’s Health Equity, but was a symposium that we would start here on a local basis with leadership and organizations here within our community, but to later expand regionally, nationally and internationally, and how we could do that, but knowing in addition, we would need a very high-powered executive director to be able to run this institute. I was privileged enough to be on that committee with Nemours leadership to be able to seek out that right person. And I can tell you it was a long process. It took longer than we anticipated, but anything worth having is worth waiting for. And when Nancy Molello came and a final group related to this position, and we sat down over lunch and had some coffee, I all of a sudden realized she’s not trying to convince me.
I really need to convince her that she needs to take this job. Nancy came with high credentials, high energy, high intellect from John Hopkins, knowing that she had seen a lot of the things that we wanted to do, but had ambition to do something so much greater. So when we had that conversation and eventually she said yes, we made her a promise, that if she were to come, that we would make sure that we would introduce her to all the major leaders in this community and give her a runway for success. And that was something that was a great joy for me in recruiting a first-class executive to lead this institute and knowing that it was in good hands, not only with Dr. Moss and this team, which we’re very impressed with but the person that wakes up every day thinking about health equity and making a difference in this community. So we’re so grateful to have Nancy with us.
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
Oh, I have to say to that is the feelings Mutual is that when I did sit down and consider this job and meeting with Marc and realizing the commitment that he had to health equity in our community and the fact that he was incredibly invested in making sure that the Institute was successful and that I had opportunities to meet with the right people here in Central Florida, it made the opportunity look so much more possible that we really could do something big. And that with his support and partnership, in a short six months, I’ve only been here six months, been able to really make a difference and make an impact. And I’m really excited to see what we can do.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Nancy, I’m curious. Give us a little bit of your background and your interest and passion for health equity.
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
Sure. Well, it’s personal for me. I grew up in Boston and I grew up in a poor family, a family that really didn’t have much. I understood what it looks like to be hungry, what it looks like to not have Christmas gifts, what it looks like to be raised by a single mom who didn’t have a job that had health insurance. I understood all of those factors and I understood what having a good education meant to my life, what opportunities can mean to a child. And had I not had opportunity, had I not had people who took an invested interest in me, I wouldn’t be here today. And so I knew at a very early age that I was going to commit to help children who didn’t have opportunities to be successful and who didn’t have the family structure to cause success, to bring a person to success, but they had other people in their lives, like the teachers that I had, the community members that surrounded me.
I realized that that’s what I wanted to do, is I really wanted to make a difference and the opportunity to come here at Nemours because, as Marc said, the DNA here at Nemours is different. And the opportunity to be at Nemours and to partner with Marc and the Ginsburg Foundation, Marc and Alan, to see that they are committed to changing lives in Central Florida, it was a no-brainer. I got on the plane and said, “If they offer me that job, I’m taking it.” Our vision is really to give every child in Central Florida an opportunity to be healthy to live their healthiest life. And if you’re going to do that, just as Marc was alluding to, you have to think about those social factors that influence health, where people live, where they work, their education, where they play. All of those factors influence health, and our goal is to create the healthiest generation of children in Central Florida.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Is this a new philosophy?
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
I wouldn’t say it’s new. I think our approach is new. I think people have been working and studying and doing research for over 25 years in health equity. Maybe it was with a different term, but I think looking at the disparities in disease and why that’s occurring, there’s been research around that for a long time. But I think what’s different here is that we’re taking it into the community. We’re saying how do we build a community partner with community, for community to develop initiatives and programs that community sees a need for in order to create the healthiest generation of children.
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
And I would also say that here at Nemours, it comes from the top. When we had conversations with the CEO, Dr. Larry Moss, and his philosophy and understanding of the commitment that this wasn’t a side program, but it was an integral part of who Nemours is and how they serve children, that inspired us to understand that this was a gift and an opportunity that could pay dividends for generations knowing that our gift to some may seem large, but to the problem, it’s small. So how do we leverage not only financial resources but our collective connections, our connective influence, draw more financial resources to build new models that not only, first and foremost, it makes an impact here in Central Florida and are a very diverse community and those that are the most vulnerable, but how those models can be replicated in certain ways in other parts of the country that can help solve some of those social ills that those communities are facing?
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
Can I also add to that, and I think Marc hit the nail on the head, is that it’s different at Nemours, and from the very top, Dr. Moss is that health equity starts at home. And so, part of our initiatives at the institute is creating programs that exemplify health equity within our own walls. Because we are community, we live in the community. Not only do we work, and we live here, and one of the programs we launched this past year as a pilot program was paying for our associates who meet a threshold or underneath the threshold of economic factors, and we pay for their children to go to summer camp because we know how important it is for some of those economically challenged individuals that work here to send their kids to summer camp. So we’re expanding that program this year, this summer. And I think that’s just an adding on to what Marc is saying is that Dr. Moss, from the highest level views health equity within our walls and outside our walls as a priority.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
It’s clear that Children’s Health Equity is a collaborative effort. We’re seeing the collaboration with Nemours and the Ginsburg Foundation. There are many other collaborators who are working on this, who are involved here. Tell me who they are and why collaboration, especially with the community, is such a vital part of this kind of work.
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
I’ll let Nancy talk to some of the specifics of the institutions that we’ve been talking with, but Orlando is very unique in its collaborative environment. This is also a very unique place of 77 plus million visitors coming here a year. So we have a lot of influx of people. We also have a huge service industry for hotels, restaurants, attractions that have low-paying jobs, and also a large immigrant influx that comes from South America and from Cuba, and well as from Puerto Rico, that we are trying to meet not only those demands as a collaborative space within our community, but also the challenges that we’re facing as a community. So, already, the road is set for collaboration. The question is how best to collaborate and with whom to address the health equity question.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Nancy?
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
So I think building on what Marc said is that Orlando is a unique place. There are organizations that are keen and very willing to work with each other. I think what I’ve seen in the past six months is that we at the institute can really be the convener because there are silos here. And I think we have a unique opportunity to bring people together from organizations that are working in the same lane but haven’t had an opportunity to work together. I think an example of this would be we are just standing up a community advisory board. We asked 15 members of the community to join us in this building, a coalition of champions around child health equity. And every one of them said yes. And those are organizations like the Boys and Girls Club, the Four Roots Foundation, the Department of Health, the Orange County Public Schools, Elevate, and more. So, we have a community that’s really ready to join hands to develop a coalition around child health equity. And I’m excited for what we can do as a collective in the future.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
And I know you’re just getting started, but who’s missing from the table right now?
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
There’s always room at this table for more.
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
There is. Amen. That’s exactly right. Is that you don’t know what you don’t know. I think one thing that Marc has done is… The first three months that I was here, Marc took me under his wing and introduced me to the community, to the people who really are interested in child health equity who need to be at the table. Some people who weren’t aware they needed to be at the table. So this is a big table and we’re ready to pull up a chair for anybody that wants to be part of the team. I think one of the things that we’ve been realizing is that we really want to stand up hubs across Central Florida. Hubs that are focused on those areas of food as medicine, healthy food, around quality education, mental health, and quality jobs, and creating a pipeline, and standing up these hubs across Central Florida where people are really coming together that are working in those areas that want to build teams, that want to build coalitions will be key to our success.
Once you really realize, okay, how do we build a playbook so that we can say, if you want to stand up an Institute for Health Equity in Chicago, here’s how you do this. Here is sort of the key things that you need in terms of the people, the place, and the programs. We’ve been very strategic in how we determined where to work in Orange County. So we looked at data, we looked at the Child Opportunity Index data, and said, “where are those communities where there’s most opportunity to improve?” Okay, let’s start to look at the COI data and say, “All right, what are organizations that are working in that community already and how do we start to build partnerships?” So once we develop a playbook that you can say using data, using those social determinants of health and creating hubs, building a coalition, you can then spread that and scale that across the state, across the country, across the world.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Marc, from the Ginsburg Foundation perspective, what do you see moving forward with the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity?
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
We envision a healthier next generation, which we understand has to go deep and wide, right? When you ask the question about scalability, that’s what we as a foundation, we look at things to scale, at the same time in the midst of scale, you can’t miss the individual in the family. So how do we build models to the point that our networks of networks give the right resources to the right people group because not every people group in the challenges those children are facing are the same? Depending on the environment they live in, the economic social development that they’re in, the schools that they’re in. So how can we have models that do align, but also are customizable within those communities so it really meets the needs of those parents, as well as those childrens within those school systems? We want to see a better health index in future for Central Florida for our kids,
That’s our goal for today, but it goes beyond that to the region, to the state, to the country, and what can we do as being a part of that solution as well as draw other funders to be able to help solve this problem, bring in national, international experts to these conversations, because solutions are coming all the time, but we have to realize that it has to affect real people today and make a difference in that child’s life today so they can have a healthier future. Because if a child does not have their health, then their future’s limited, and we want them to have unlimited potential for their future.
Nancy Molello, Executive Director, Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity, Nemours Children’s Health:
Can I say that I think Marc brings up a really great point, is that what works in one community may not work in another community, but if we can build a playbook that helps that community get started, that’s giving them a jump on what maybe will take us two years to get to the place to where we can see measurable, real, tangible impact. But it is local communities. What works in one community is not going to work in another community or in another state. There’s different politics at play, different policies at play, different environments, different education. So I think that that’s spot on is that it’s really local, but we can help people get to the next place, help people have a platform to start from, that they’re not starting from zero, that maybe they can start from three or four on the rung.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
I’m curious; you talked about the individual. Ultimately, this needs to benefit the individual child as well as the community, the state, the nation, and possibly even the world.
Marc McMurrin, President & CEO, Ginsburg Family Foundation:
I would say when we talk about the individual, especially with children, there’s a couple simple factors. When we talked earlier about food as medicine, helping educate children on healthy food, which creates healthy bodies and healthy minds, and having access to quality food and what that looks like. Obviously exercise and movement, and then a nurturing, loving environment, for those that grew up poor. Not all of us grew up in fortunate circumstances, but if you grew up in a poor environment, a lot of times, people would say, “I never knew I was poor.” If they were loved, if they were fed well and given an environment to thrive and an education opportunity to excel.
So we do want to focus on those social determinants of health and those environments where economically they have those challenges, but those are things that can be overcome with some real investment in food as medicine as well as the Boys and Girls Clubs provide great after-school programs. We have a very robust Boys and Girls Club program here in Central Florida with some great leaders that continue to make an impact for those children in those environments and then investing in parents and those environments as well to help create a healthy home, to help create a healthy future for those children.
Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Marc McMurrin is President and CEO of the Ginsburg Family Foundation, talking about the work now underway at the Ginsburg Institute for Health Equity at Nemours Children’s Health. We also heard from Nancy Molello, Executive Director of the Institute.
Music:
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Carol Vassar, podcast host/producer:
Thanks to both Marc and Nancy for taking the time to be on the podcast, and thanks to you for listening. Another initiative of the institute is the Ginsburg Scholars Program, which prepares members of the healthcare and scientific workforce to do research into Children’s Health Equity and deploy resources into diverse communities, both locally and around the world. We had the chance to learn more about the program from a current scholar, and you’ll hear that in the companion episode to this one, both of those episodes, in fact, all of our episodes may be found on our podcast’s website, nemourswellbeyond.org. That’s nemourswellbeyond.org. Our production team includes Che Parker, Cheryl Munn, Susan Masucci, and Lauren Tata. I’m Carol Vassar. And remember, together, we can change children’s health for good. Well Beyond Medicine.
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