Pinnacle Perspectives, Spring 2023

A Better Way of Doing Medicine

Tyler Hartman, MD, a neonatologist at Children's Hospital at Dartmouth, tells a tale of two babies. Both born weeks early, Owen was on a ventilator to help him breathe as he fought a brutal infection, and Libby was being fed through a nasogastric (NG) tube but was otherwise stable and healthy. So why was Owen at home, and Libby in the Intensive Care Nursery? Doctors, nurses, and other health professionals see discrepancies and weaknesses like these in healthcare delivery, and they envision solutions. But there’s little opportunity for them to be proactive when they spend their busy days reacting. Time outside of a system is essential to making changes within it.

Launched by a gift to the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth from Susan and Richard Levy, PhD, D’60, the Susan & Richard Levy Health Care Delivery Incubator is a joint initiative between

Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center and based at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice. The Incubator supports projects focused on improving patient outcomes, prioritizing patientand family-centered care, reducing spending, and promoting scholarly work. Importantly, it gives project leaders like Hartman protected time in which to further their ideas.

Hope Grows at Home was among the first cohort of Incubator funded projects. Led by Hartman, who’s also an assistant professor at Geisel, and nurse practitioner, Kathryn Richards, MSN, APRN, the project redesigned care for stable preterm infants by transitioning their feeding from the hospital to the home with extensive support and monitoring. “This was an opportunity to do something locally that’s focused on improving care and cost reduction. If you can nail those

IN THIS ISSUE: A Better Way of Doing Medicine

The IRA Charitable Rollover Gift Annuity Plan

You're Invited: 2023 Pinnacle Society Luncheon

two, that’s a better way of doing medicine,” says Hartman.

The project generated innovations with far-reaching impact: collaborating with engineers from Thayer, Hartman and Richards designed a new NG tube that’s easier to place and are now working on patenting their invention; physicians throughout Dartmouth Health are considering ways the continuous monitoring system may allow them to safely send their patients home sooner; enhanced feeding strategies developed for the program have been implemented in DHMC’s Intensive Care Nursery; and Hartman and Richards have developed a collaborative nationally with centers running similar programs to share data. 

Tyler Hartman, MD, and Kathryn Richards, MSN, APRN, envisioned a better way to care for stable preterm infants.

Abbie and Matt Hale with their daughter, Libby.

The IRA Charitable Rollover Gift Annuity Plan

Are you interested in receiving income for life in return for a donation from your IRA? Under a new law effective in 2023, those over age 70 ½ can make a qualified charitable distribution in exchange for a charitable gift annuity.

A qualified charitable distribution (QCD)—sometimes called a “charitable rollover”—is a contribution from your IRA directly to the charity of your choice. Unlike other distributions from your retirement accounts, you pay no income tax on a traditional QCD. Although there is no charitable deduction for your QCD contribution, it counts toward your required minimum distribution.

The new Legacy IRA Act allows for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to donate up to $50,000 in one or

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In the News

Twenty-two percent of Dartmouth Cancer Center patients are food-insecure. In response to this need, the Center launched a pilot pantry project in February 2022. So far, the pilot has provided more than 150 unique patients with almost 800 bags of food. The Dartmouth Cancer Center Food Pantry is now expanding, with a goal of feeding 2,000+ food insecure cancer patients each year.

more QCDs to fund one or more charitable gift annuities within the same year. A charitable gift annuity is a simple contract between you and a charity promising to pay you or your spouse a fixed amount of money each year for life in exchange for your charitable contribution. Unlike a standard charitable gift annuity, payments from a QCDfunded annuity are taxed entirely as ordinary income, but the taxation takes place over a number of years, as payments are received, rather than all at once.

Give from your IRA and receive a lifetime of payments!

As you continue to plan for today and your future, consider this new law in your financial and philanthropic planning. 

A Gift in Your Will

A gift in your will that supports the work of Dartmouth Health and/or Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth should be directed to:

One Medical Center Drive, Lebanon, NH 03756

Tax ID# 26-4812335 (for DH) and Tax ID# 02-0222111 (for Geisel).

Sample language:

“I hereby, give, devise, and bequeath to , One Medical Center Drive, Lebanon NH 03756, tax ID # the following sum [state the amount of the gift or asset(s)], or percent ( %) of my residuary estate, whichever is less, to this purpose:

The Nathan Smith Society—a Dartmouth student organization that supports students interested in healthcare careers—is celebrating the 25th anniversary of its clinical shadowing program . Each term, the program pairs around 100 students with practicing physicians at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center.

For more information about tax-wise giving, please contact Katherine D. Blackman, Director of Planned Giving. Email DH.Geisel.Planned.Giving@dartmouth.edu, or phone at (603) 646-5858. You can also visit DHGeiselPlannedGiving.org. All inquiries are confidential.

Cardiac care in Northern New England will get a boost with the opening of Dartmouth Health's new Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) Patient Pavilion in May 2023. DHMC will be increasing the number of beds for heart and vascular patients by 25 percent, including a new unit for nonsurgical patients.

Despite the many advances made in academic medicine in recent decades, successfully applying what is learned in research to patient care remains a major challenge. With the establishment of the new Dartmouth Center for Implementation Science (DCIS) at the Geisel School of Medicine, community partners across the Dartmouth enterprise will work to help close those gaps.