Local assistance will always be a basic necessity for the survival and prosperity of hospitals and medical schools.  Even smaller facilities such as those dedicated purely to research requires a large helping of such backing, particularly where money is concerned.  Oftentimes, these generous donors can be found contributing to more than one institution, as is the case with Isaac Toussie and family when it comes to the top two leading lights of New York in healthcare education and practice, Weill Cornell Medical College and the North Shore-LIJ network of hospitals and research centers.

Weill Cornell is named after its two single best benefactors, Ezra Cornell, of Western Union fame, and Sanford I. Weill, former CEO and chairman of Citigroup, Incorporated.  As one of the most selective such institutions in the country, admitting only some one hundred applicants out of almost six thousand hopefuls every year.  Also, Weill Cornell was first to accept women right alongside men as well as the first American medical school to establish its own premises abroad, right outside of the capital of Qatar, Doha.  Many a notable graduate has boosted the school’s reputation over the years, health professionals like C. Everett Koop, U.S. Surgeon General; Robert C. Atkins of the eponymous diet; Nobel Prize winner Robert W. Holley; and Henry Heimlich of the Heimlich Maneuver.  The North Shore-LIJ Health System is the second largest healthcare network in the country as measured by the number of beds and the largest in New York State based on patient revenue.  It serves over seven million people a year through more than forty-two thousand employees - the single largest employer on Long Island and ninth largest largest in the City of New York.

Both are successful in large part due to strong communal backing, whether in the form of charitable donations from prominent businessmen and women or donated time by community volunteers of civic or religious organizations.  Even with an annual budget of several billions between them, vigorous local support will never be unnecessary for the health of Weill Cornell and North Shore-LIJ!