A massive sheet of glass towers above a walkway in Irvine that cancer patients will soon be passing daily, some likely nervous and unsure, others hopeful.
The window declares a simple message in bold lettering: “There is no profit in curing the body if in the process we destroy the soul.”
That line, attributed to City of Hope founder Samuel Golter, is the “ethos” of the cancer care center’s mission, said Annette Walker, president of City of Hope’s expanding Orange County operations.
The same quote is displayed at City of Hope’s first campus in Duarte, a reminder that the expert treatment delivered by the research and care program is as much about humanity as it is health, she said.
As City of Hope prepares to open the doors to its newest hub, a 190,000-square-foot outpatient facility in Irvine, its leaders say a patient-first design has been infused in its every corner. In the works for more than four years, the four-story cancer center is finally complete and will debut during a grand opening ceremony on Wednesday, July 27.
The medical center, which will be a facility where people with cancer can go for outpatient diagnoses, treatment and surgeries, will be ready to start welcoming visitors before the end of August, officials said. With experts in preventative care, the center will also be a place where those who are at risk of cancer or want to find out if they are can go for testing and information.
Part of City of Hope’s $1 billion expansion into Orange County, the massive outpatient facility joins a network that includes clinics in Newport Beach and Huntington Beach. A hospital is also being constructed next door to the Irvine center, and the 32 inches of space between them will eventually be connected with a doorway when it opens in 2025. Wednesday’s celebration includes a groundbreaking for the hospital.
With the new facilities, City of Hope leaders hope to make cancer care more accessible to OC residents, who have been driving more than two hours each way to receive treatment at the hospital’s Duarte campus. People will be able to start making appointments Aug. 8 at the Irvine center, which will accept “a wide range of insurance and coverage types,” said City of Hope Orange County spokeswoman Lisa O’Neill Hill, including in- and out-of-network plans, Medi-Cal and Medicare.
And “depending on a patient’s insurance, patients may be directly referred to City of Hope by their provider or they can refer themselves,” she said.
City of Hope’s growing campus joins a recently super-charged expansion of health care in Irvine. UC Irvine is also building a new hospital and specialty care centers as part of a $1.3 billion medical complex under development next to its university campus and Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian is developing three new medical institutes at its Irvine hospital campus, expected to open in 2025.
All that added medical footprint is a good thing, providing more resources for patients, said Dr. Edward Kim, physician-in-chief for City of Hope Orange County.
City of Hope brings to the table its unique focus solely on cancer, he said.
“That’s all we do,” Kim said. “We don’t deliver babies. We don’t do knees, hips. This is all we do. And so it is our duty and our obligation to bring the most state-of-the-art equipment and experts to this campus.”
Those who seek care at City of Hope have the unique benefit of a network of cancer specialists who are experts in not just common cancers, such as breast or prostate cancer, “but also the rare ones, the ones that people sometimes don’t want to admit they’re not sure what to do,” Kim said.
“We don’t look at the textbooks, we write the textbooks,” he said.
Among some of the newest innovations that will be available to patients are machines used for diagnostic scans and body imaging that “really do everything possible from a software perspective, as well as a hardware perspective, to reduce the amount of radiation that we’re giving patients when we’re getting their images,” said Jessica Patel, the center’s director of diagnostic radiology, during a recent tour of the nearly finished facility.
And on the treatment side, equipment that makes delivering radiation more precise and efficient will also be in the arsenal, with a machine that can help doctors see images of tumors in real time to help target them.
Patel, who joined the City of Hope staff in March 2021 from the Children’s Hospital of Orange County, called the equipment that will outfit the Irvine center the “latest, most state-of-the-art things that are on the market.”
Research and clinical trials will also be conducted at the facility, opening the possibility for patients to try new medicines.
Having such specialized care in the city “makes a big difference for all of us,” Khan said, noting that the focus on clinical trials is a key component of what City of Hope is bringing to the area.
“For those that maybe didn’t think they had an opportunity to try something new, they actually will have that opportunity here,” she said.
While the medical center’s leaders have focused on getting the best machinery for care, Kim said they haven’t overlooked how the patient experience extends beyond tests and treatment.
While lying for a CT scan or MRI, patients can look up at original artwork displayed on the ceiling, listen to music or even watch a movie during some testing. Those being treated with chemotherapy will enjoy floor-to-ceiling windows with mountain views, while sitting in furniture chosen by actual cancer patients based on their look and feel.
On the third floor, a small salon and boutique will carry wigs, prostheses, essential oils and such; it will be operated by cosmetologists to provide a haven for women going through cancer treatment.
And outside, a “healing garden” with a variety of plants selected for their medicinal value will offer patients a serene setting for getting some fresh air.
“We’re trying not to make this seem like it’s a hospital,” Kim said, noting that a cancer diagnosis, or even a scare, can be “devastating” for patients and their families.
The idea behind the facility’s design is to provide “anything we can do to really focus on treating the whole thing.”
“We want to treat the mind, body, soul, everything,” Kim said. “That’s what is in our DNA.”
