Health CareFriday, November 13
UI Health Care will name its main hospital after donor Richard O. Jacobson
The Good Day Iowa City team
If you drive past UI Hospitals and Clinics, the main hospital is getting a donor's name. University of Iowa Health Care will rename its main campus hospital after a $70 million gift from the late Richard Jacobson. The Gazette reported that the Board of Regents would consider moving his naming rights there at a meeting the following week.
His foundation committed the gift in 2022 to an 842,000-square-foot inpatient tower planned next to Kinnick Stadium. UIHC has scrapped that tower.
The scrapped inpatient tower would have covered 842,000 square feet
Floor area of the scrapped inpatient tower, beside places you know
15 football fields would fit inside the scrapped inpatient tower
Source: The Gazette
View as table
| Floor area | |
|---|---|
| The scrapped inpatient tower | 842,000 sq. ft. (Next to Kinnick Stadium) |
| A football field | 57,600 sq. ft. (end zones included) |
| A Walmart Supercenter | about 180,000 sq. ft. |
UIHC pitched the tower on more federal Medicaid support through a directed payment program. Recent federal changes, including limits on state-directed payments expected to pull nearly $10 billion from Iowa over the next decade, took that funding away.
The $70 million gift was meant for a $2.2 billion tower
- $70 million
- gift, the largest in UI history
- $2.2 billion
- projected cost of the scrapped tower
- about 180
- inpatient beds the tower would have added
Sources: Iowa City Press-Citizen, The Gazette
- Directed payment revenue, fiscal 2026: $465.7 million
- Deficit without it: $124.1 million
- Tower timeline: would have run until 2030
Sources: Iowa City Press-Citizen, The Gazette