Morsanis give $20 million for new USF medical school

The University of South Florida is receiving $20 million, the biggest single gift in its history, from Tampa philanthropists Frank and Carol Morsani to help build a new medical school bearing the couple's name.

It "signals what I think is going to become a bonanza of philanthropy for USF Health," said USF College of Medicine Dean Stephen Klasko.

The donation will fund USF's efforts to create a new health care model "to make the old model obsolete," he said.

The gift also reflects the bond that has formed between the Morsanis and Klasko, who came to USF in 2004.

The couple already gave USF $17 million for health initiatives, including an outpatient clinic on campus. Beyond USF, the Morsanis have given millions to other Tampa institutions such as the David A. Straz Jr. Center for the Performing Arts.

Morsani said he and his wife have watched as Klasko launched one new project after another, from a medical simulation teaching center in downtown Tampa to an education program designed to develop emotional intelligence in doctors.

"I don't think our community as a whole recognizes the impact that this institution has on our region, state and nation," said Morsani, 80, who became wealthy as a car dealer.

He's hoping $20 million will get people's attention and help raise the total $60 million needed to replace USF's aging medical teaching facilities.

Part of the money will go toward creating the Klasko Institute for an Optimistic Future in Healthcare.

The center's overall goal will be to help health care professionals learn new ways of thinking and practicing to survive in a demanding, fast-changing health care environment, Klasko said.

Doctors who want to have successful practices will need, for instance, to respond more quickly to their patients, Klakso said. USF already is trying to do that at the outpatient clinic, the Carol and Frank Morsani Center for Advanced Health Care, by guaranteeing patients same-day test results.

"Why should you have to wait nine days to get results of a mammogram?" Klasko asked.

Morsani said he has the same approach to life. "The only constant is change." And the need to adapt to modern demands is critical in health care.

"We feel strongly that we have to reform our delivery system of medical care to our citizens," he said. "We think that USF is attempting to do that better than anyone we know in the country."

By the end of 2012, USF expects to break ground on the Morsani College of Medicine, which will be near the Morsani outpatient clinic, on Holly Drive, Klasko said.

The new building will be the "medical school of the future," with an open design to encourage everyone there — student doctors, nurses and pharmacists — to work together, he said.

"We're not going to be siloed."

And the new medical school will offer free health care to the community.

USF already does that through its off-campus Bridge Healthcare Clinic. "This will be like what we've done with Bridge, but on steroids," Klasko said.

"We're going to have students learning from patients and patients learning from students."

The donation and the validation that comes with it is an honor for Klasko, he said.

It's "the greatest thing that's happened to me in my career."

But Morsani said he doesn't want the gift to seem like anything extraordinary.

"We're just doing what we're supposed to do on a daily basis," he said. "We don't feel we're doing anything special. That's not the piece of cloth we're cut from."