Florida Atlantic University’s Marcus Institute of Integrative Health has been awarded a monumental $6 million grant from the late Bernie Marcus and The Marcus Foundation to broaden its services, enhance educational programs, and expand community wellness initiatives.
According to certain reports, the overarching goal behind doing so is to create a national model that relays the effectiveness of comprehensive integrative health as an optimal approach to achieve overall well-being for everyone.
More on the given grant would reveal how it brings FAU’s total contributions for advancing integrative health to more than $10 million, thus establishing the institute as a transformational hub for advances in this unique field.
Talk about this institute on a slightly deeper level, launched in 2019 with a separate grant from The Marcus Foundation, the FAU Marcus Institute of Integrative Health is best known for providing exceptional patient care, innovative educational programs, impactful community engagement, and advanced integrative medicine.
Thus far, the institute has also developed advanced programs for integrative pain management, and precision image-guided injection therapies for chronic pain, sports injuries, and mental health.
“We are incredibly grateful for the unwavering support of The Marcus Foundation, which has been instrumental in advancing our mission,” said Stacy Volnick, President of Florida Atlantic University. “This generous grant enhances the quality of care we can provide locally and allows us to contribute to the broader field of integrative health on a national scale. We are excited about the opportunities ahead and committed to making a meaningful difference in the lives of the 3.2 million people in our service area.”
Another detail worth a mention here is rooted in how FAU has conceived a comprehensive telemedicine model which effectively provides functional and integrative medicine treatments to patients across the country.
More on this comprehensive telemedicine model would reveal that, as an accelerated healing program, it combines metabolic health optimization with image-guided injection therapies to benefit professional athletes. The model is also on track to become a national health care destination.
Joining that is a pilot program which talks to how effectiveness of FAU’s ultrasound-guided stellate ganglion blocks has already achieved significant success.
As for what the organization plans on doing with its latest piece of funding, it will use it to expand its operations and provide more services, as well as conduct more research.
Furthermore, managed by FAU’s Schmidt College of Medicine, the institute will also implement a three-tier expansion plan that prioritizes high quality, superior patient outcomes, and will include added services, such as diagnostic musculoskeletal ultrasounds, intravenous sedation, tai chi, a functional movement specialist, and a nutrition coach.
While we are on the institute’s future plans, we must also mention that FAU will also have at least two doctors enrolled in the Integrative Medicine Fellowship at Jefferson Health. This it will do in close collaboration with the Marcus Institute of Integrative Health-Jefferson Health over the next four years.
To expand upon the stated collaboration, it will allow up to 12 trainees per year to earn advanced practice certificates in mind-body medicine or integrative nutrition. Among other things, we ought to mention that community wellness programs will continue to thrive, and therefore, offer 52 nutritional classes aimed at engaging 1,500 participants across 150 integrative health classes. The Institute also plans to enroll 1,000 students in the program and conduct 50 retreats for veterans.
“Thanks to the generous support from The Marcus Foundation, we have seen remarkable educational output, hosting more than 12 community events each month,” said Jennifer Caceres, M.D., acting dean of the FAU Schmidt College of Medicine. “Our first cohort of medical students has successfully completed their certificates in integrative health, and we’ve launched extensive HealthFirst initiatives to promote community wellness. Moving forward, we are committed to enhancing our educational curriculum and advancing our clinical services in integrative medicine. We remain committed to fostering an integrative health model that combines clinical excellence, and patient-centered care.”
