Top Funding Priorities 2024

Health Equity CLE Fund

The Health Equity CLE Fund will provide resources to targeted initiatives that eradicate health disparities and improve the health and wealth of all patients and communities.

Learn More About the Health Equity CLE Fund

Community Health Workers

Community health workers will be joining the staff throughout our facilities, including Emergency Departments, to identify people visiting the ED for reasons related to basic human needs, such as a meal or warm shelter, and connect them with helpful resources, relieving the nursing staff of this time-intensive task to better focus on patient care.

Food as Medicine

In partnership with the Greater Cleveland Food Bank, MetroHealth’s Food as Medicine Clinics provide eligible patients with a food “prescription” for two visits per month, when they receive a three-day supply of healthful food for their entire family. In 2023, more than 40,000 meals reached Cleveland families through this program.

School Health Program

Launched 10 years ago in an elementary school classroom, the School Health Program provides traditional, much-needed primary care as well as urgent medical care to at-risk students—right at school. Today, this program is a national model for school-based health delivery.

Students Are Free to Express (SAFE) Project

Implemented directly in the classroom during the school day, SAFE provides K through 12th-grade students professional teaching artists who use spoken word, theatre, music, dance, and visual arts to promote individual resilience; encourage emotional awareness and regulation; validate and normalize the experiences of youth; and foster hope and encourage forward thinking.

Institute for H.O.P.E.™ General Fund

Through the Institute for H.O.P.E.™, MetroHealth can assess a more complete picture of patients’ lives, including social needs such as access to food insecurity, safe housing, transportation, job opportunities and more. Gifts to the General I4HOPE fund can be used to support the immediate needs of I4HOPE programs, such as those listed above as well as:

• Center for Arts in Health – Integrates performing, literary and visual arts into healthcare and community settings for therapeutic, educational and expressive purposes.
• Community Advocacy Program: A Medical-Legal Partnership - MetroHealth caregivers team with attorneys from The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland to help at-risk patients overcome barriers to good health.

Learn More About the Institute for H.O.P.E.™

MRI Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES)

MetroHealth’s FES Center is world-renowned for the development and clinical implementation of sophisticated electrical stimulation systems that reanimate paralyzed muscles; restore limb, trunk, respiratory, bowel and bladder function; and facilitate neurological recovery following stroke, brain injury and spinal cord injury. 

MRI Research Equipment Fund

To complement MetroHealth’s state-of-the-art clinical, research and education space in the Old Brooklyn Health Center, additional resources are needed to improve laboratory space and purchase equipment required to support active research projects. 

Benjamin S. Gerson Endowment

MetroHealth’s Benjamin S. Gerson Family Resource Center connects patients with community resources after a life-altering event, going beyond rehabilitative therapy to support them as they navigate their new normal. Patients are referred to resources to assist them with finding accessible housing, financial counseling, mortgage modifications, transportation, home health and respite care, medical equipment and more.

The MRI Endowed Professorship in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation

In collaboration with Case Western Reserve University’s School of Medicine, this endowment will provide a guaranteed stream of income to continue and expand innovative research, facilitate innovative collaborations, attract talented clinicians and scientists, and support faculty retention.

Learn More About the MetroHealth Rehabilitation Institute

Behavioral Health Workforce Development Program

To meet Northeast Ohio’s dire need for mental health treatment, MetroHealth has added the 112-bed Behavioral Health Hospital to its Cleveland Heights Medical Center. MetroHealth is now working toward expanding and enhancing its ability to care for a growing behavioral health patient population by increasing the pipeline of behavioral health professionals trained and retained in Cuyahoga County, including psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses, counselors/social workers, and behavioral health specialists.