Good afternoon, and welcome everyone to our Community Health Benefits discussion at National Jewish Health. We appreciate everyone taking the time to be here today.
Just before we get started, we have a few quick notes to help the flow. Your microphones have been muted. You can type questions into the question-and-answer box at the bottom of your screen. We have a person monitoring that, and if we have time, we will include answers at the end of the event. Otherwise, this Zoom session is being recorded, and we will post it on our website by April 2nd.
So again, thank you for joining.
We have several folks in the meeting today. I’m Lauren Green-Caldwell, Vice President of Communications, and here to take us through the information we want to share today is Dr. Michael Salem, who is President and CEO. Chris Forkner, our Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs, will cover a number of topics.
Our research mission will be covered by Dr. Greg Downey, who is our Executive Vice President of Academic Affairs and Provost. Our hospital transformation programs will be presented by Dr. Carrie, who is our Chief Medical Officer. Our clinical approach and some details about what’s happening clinically will be shared by Dr. Steve Frankel, who is our Executive Vice President of Clinical Affairs.
Our community programs will then be covered by Dr. Michael Salem, and we’ll return for questions and answers. We had several questions come in in preparation, so we’ll share those, along with the ones that come in as we go through this.
With that, I will turn it over to Dr. Salem.
Thanks everybody for joining today. National Jewish Health has been around for more than 126 years, and we are indeed a mission-driven organization.
Our mission since 1899: heal, discover, and educate as a preeminent healthcare institution that we serve by providing the best integrated and innovative care for children and adults, by understanding and finding cures for the diseases we research, and by educating and training the next generation of healthcare professionals to be leaders in medicine and science.
We have been at the corner of Colorado and Colfax for over 126 years.
About why National Jewish Health is the leading respiratory hospital in the nation—it really comes from our beginnings. Boards of directors make decisions, and the board of National Jewish back 126 years ago decided that the only patients who could be admitted to the hospital were homeless patients—those who didn’t have any means to pay. At that time, the last respiratory pandemic, for which there were no cures, was tuberculosis.
National Jewish never sent a patient a bill until 1970.
The second thing to know about National Jewish Health is that it had to become a very innovative place because there were no antibiotics for tuberculosis until the 1950s. From 1899 through the 1950s, it had to be doing very innovative things.
So in taking care of children and adults, they had a dairy on campus. They thought keeping patients outside with exercise was important, and they were doing very innovative things, like, in the lower right-hand corner, the picture of taking out parts of people’s lungs for tuberculosis.
The motto for National Jewish was: none may enter who can pay, none can pay who enter.
The third thing to know is that National Jewish had to do research since there were no antibiotics. They had to figure out these respiratory and other diseases. So they built the first research building outside of a university campus back in 1915.
So: charitable mission, innovative place, and commitment to research and clinical care.
A lot of great discoveries have been made here that have benefited not only the Colorado community, but people around the nation and the world.
The basis of many allergic diseases is a molecule called IgE, which is central to severe allergic attacks.
We pioneered combined chemotherapy for tuberculosis. We’ve all heard a lot about the immune system, particularly during COVID—fighting bacteria and viruses. Our immune system is an elegant system made up of T cells, B cells, and many other types of cells that need to communicate with one another.
On the T cell is a receptor, among others, that was first described at National Jewish Health.
Many people, particularly children with severe food allergies, require oral food challenges, and that gold standard was first described here.
We are still involved in a study called COPDGene, the largest study in the United States, involving 10,500 patients and 22 medical centers, including Brigham and Women’s Hospital. That study is ongoing.
We developed multiple diagnostic platforms to test for COVID, receiving three FDA emergency use authorizations and performing up to five or six thousand tests a day from around the country.
So a lot of important research is ongoing here.
National Jewish is, without question, the leading respiratory hospital in the nation, supported by multiple metrics. Not only U.S. News & World Report rankings, but also the largest pulmonary faculty in the country, high patient satisfaction scores in the top one percent, top six percent in NIH funding, over 500 publications per year, and many other indicators.
We are also a national organization. Most of our patients come from Colorado, but about 29 percent of our patient care revenue comes from patients across the country who come to us after seeking care elsewhere.
We are a leader in collaborative, multi-specialty care for adults and children. This includes cardiology, rheumatology, neurology, gastroenterology, cancer care, critical care, cystic fibrosis, and more.
In pediatrics, we offer multi-specialty care in allergy, asthma, atopic dermatitis, behavioral health, food allergies, immune deficiencies, and more.
We collaborate locally and nationally, including partnerships with the CU School of Medicine, Intermountain Health, Rocky Mountain Hospital for Children, Mount Sinai in New York, and Jefferson Health in Philadelphia.
What is community benefit?
Community benefit refers to programs and services that address community health needs, regardless of ability to pay, and improve access to healthcare, public health, education, and overall wellbeing.
How are these programs funded?
Through grants, philanthropy, federal programs like 340B, and other dedicated funding sources that support charity care and community benefit programs.
We continue to add physicians across specialties to meet community needs. We are relatively small from an inpatient perspective and focus on keeping patients out of the hospital when possible.
Most of our care is outpatient, but we still serve Medicaid patients needing inpatient care.
We have 167 employees nationwide, 188 physicians, and 18 Colorado locations.
From a community benefit standpoint, we dedicate significant resources. In 2024, charity care and program shortfalls totaled $9.4 million, not including nearly $50 million in unreimbursed Medicare care.
We also invest:
- $4.3 million in education
- $1.4 million in outreach
- $2.4 million in the Morgridge Academy
- $2.8 million in subsidized health services
- $16.8 million in research subsidies
The research mission has been central since our inception. Current priorities include asthma, climate-related disease, pulmonary disease, allergy, lung cancer, and more.
We also focus on basic science, genomics, stem cells, epidemiology, and clinical trials.
Recent research includes:
- Early-life viral infections and asthma risk
- New protein targets for asthma
- Lung damage from desert dust exposure
- Skin biomarkers for immune response
We operate major research programs like COPDGene and pediatric asthma studies, and conduct research on air pollution and lung disease in vulnerable populations.
Our hospital transformation program focuses on access, continuity of care, and pediatric safety.
We operate several community programs:
- Lung Line (free nurse-staffed service)
- Miners Clinic of Colorado
- Radiation exposure screening
- Environmental health research center
- Immune deficiency events
- Patient conferences
- Long COVID care programs
- Immediate Care Clinic (non-emergency)
We are also the largest provider of smoking and vaping cessation services in the country, helping nearly 3 million people.
Other programs include:
- Community garden
- Morgridge Academy (K-8 school for children with chronic illness)
The academy provides:
- Small class sizes
- Medical support
- Free meals
- Technology access
- Experiential learning
Our focus areas include:
- Expanding access to specialty care
- Pediatric respiratory health
- Education for patients and professionals
We will now move into the Q&A portion.
One question was about behavioral health for older adults. While we do not provide ongoing adult mental health treatment, we offer screenings and referrals through our social work team.
Another question was about long COVID. We operate a multidisciplinary center providing care, rehabilitation, and clinical trials.
Another question asked about the school. It is located on our main campus at Colorado and Colfax. Families can call 303-398-1102 for information or to apply.
National Jewish Health sees patients from around the nation and the world. Many patients come from Denver and the surrounding counties. For the purposes of this assessment, we have defined our community as Denver County and four contiguous counties — Adams, Arapahoe, Jefferson and Douglas counties — in which a majority of our local patients live. As a tertiary care hospital focused on respiratory health, we have further defined our community as those who will benefit from diagnosis, treatment and prevention of respiratory disease.
View 2025 Community Health Needs Assessment (PDF)
