UNMC and its primary clinical partner, Nebraska Medicine, received the inaugural Summit Award on March 24 at the Commercial Real Estate (CRE) Summit.
The award was presented to UNMC Chancellor Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D., by David Brown, president and CEO of the Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce, at a luncheon attended by more than 800 people at the CenturyLink Center in Omaha.
The Summit Award was created to recognize a company, organization, or entity that has made an extraordinary impact on Greater Omaha’s real estate development. Selection is based on several criteria including impact on employment, community and financial investments, technology, and construction within the real estate community.
In presenting the award, Brown praised UNMC/Nebraska Medicine “for raising Omaha’s profile on the world stage.”
In his acceptance speech, Dr. Gold lauded the community for its incredible support of the medical center. He ended by telling the audience, “The best is yet to come.”
Brown referenced all the construction that has transformed the UNMC/Nebraska Medicine campus over the past two decades. These included at least 10 major construction projects, with several of these funded in large part through philanthropic support.
He noted that in just over two months, UNMC/Nebraska Medicine will open the Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center, a $323 million project that is the largest construction project ever undertaken by the medical center.
He also mentioned the Global Center for Advanced Interprofessional Learning, a $118.9 million building that will change the way health professionals learn new skills and acquire new knowledge.
The center, which is expected to be completed late in 2018, will house UNMC’s iEXCEL℠ (Interprofessional Experiential Center for Enduring Learning) program, which will expose students to interprofessional clinical simulation training exercises, surgical skills training and realistic environments through virtual and augmented reality, holographic and visualization techniques.