Our community deserves health care that’s not only excellent — but responsive, innovative, and ready for tomorrow.
The Montage Health Foundation Innovation and Excellence Fund — comprised of unrestricted gifts — powers our ability to deliver outstanding health care while meeting the evolving needs of the people of our community.
With support from visionary donors, this fund gives our care teams the flexibility to meet urgent needs, pilot new programs, and accelerate ideas that shape the future of health care for everyone we serve.
Why your unrestricted gift matters
Today, Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula ranks among the top 5% of hospitals nationwide for overall clinical care, and in the top 15% for patient experience, according to Healthgrades. Our care environments have also earned national acclaim for their calming, innovative design — a hallmark of our commitment to excellence.
But sustaining this standard of care is becoming harder. In Monterey County, 80% of our patients rely on Medicare or Medi-Cal — which reimburse well below the actual cost of care. At the same time, expenses for labor, medication, and supplies continue to rise.
When you give to this fund, you:
Respond swiftly to emerging needs
Pilot breakthrough ideas
Invest in new technologies and treatments
Grow and sustain a skilled, compassionate workforce
Support vital community health services
As a nonprofit, we remain committed to serving everyone who needs us — without compromising the quality of care. Philanthropy makes that promise possible. Your support helps close the financial gap, fuels innovation to make care more efficient, and empowers us to adopt proven best practices that improve access, quality, and outcomes.
With your partnership, we can ensure that exceptional care remains within reach for all who call this community home.
Your partnership powers progress
Ways to give:
Make a gift — Support the fund with a leadership gift that reflects your values and creates lasting impact.
Pledge over time — Spread your investment over multiple years to maximize impact while meeting your philanthropic goals.
Give through your business or foundation — Partner with us to invest in innovative solutions that benefit your employees, your community, and your legacy.
Explore legacy giving — Include the Innovation and Excellence Fund in your estate plans to ensure your values live on through local healthcare excellence.
Because this is an unrestricted fund, your generosity goes to work immediately — where it’s needed most.
I’ve always felt that unrestricted giving is almost twice as valuable as restricted giving. I have a lot of confidence in the people who run Montage Health – and my feeling is that they know best where the money needs to go.
David Benjamin, Donor and Former Board Trustee
Stories of
impact
Explore examples of how gifts to the Innovation and Excellence Fund are already transforming lives in Monterey County.
Earlier answers. Brighter futures.
Philanthropy launched Montage Health’s cancer genetic risk assessment program, empowering patients with vital information about their inherited cancer risk.
For one patient, Dina Ruiz, testing revealed she carried the BRCA2 gene mutation, dramatically increasing her risk for breast and ovarian cancers. This knowledge allowed her to pursue proactive screenings and preventive surgery to drastically reduce her risk. It also empowered her daughter, Morgan, to get tested — revealing the same mutation and giving both women the chance to take preventative action early.
I felt extremely empowered to be able to get a hold on this before I developed cancer. What a gift.
Dina
Ruiz, local writer/public speaker
Leading-edge technology, local impact
Thanks to visionary donor investment, Montage Health has brought state-of-theart hybrid operating rooms to Monterey County. These advanced surgical suites, typically found only in major metropolitan or academic medical centers, are fueling the growth of our critical programs in cardiac, endovascular, and neurosurgery care.
One powerful example: in partnership with the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), we can now perform thrombectomy — a highly specialized, time-sensitive procedure to remove stroke-causing blood clots from the brain. Before, patients often had to be transferred to the Bay Area, losing precious time while an average of 1.9 million brain cells died each minute.
These leading-edge spaces mean more lives saved, faster recoveries, and better outcomes — because donors ensured worldclass care could happen right here at home.
Community Hospitals don’t usually have this kind of technology. It means we’re better able to attract top physicians, and give patients access to world-class care without leaving our community.
Dr. Ahmad Edris, Montage Health physician
Strengthening access to primary and specialty care
Across the nation and here at home, doctor shortages are straining access to care. But philanthropy can help us close this gap.
Donor investment has transformed Montage Medical Group (MMG) from a team of 4 providers in 2009 to over 100 today, now covering 17 specialties and delivering more than 230,000 patient visits each year.
In addition, philanthropy launched our Center for Physician Excellence, providing wraparound support services to help physicians grow, thrive, and plant roots in Monterey County.
Impact to date
100+ MMG providers 17 specialties
230,000+ patient visits per year
Prevention that saves lives
Philanthropy makes it possible for Montage Health to offer life-changing programs that don’t generate revenue — but do save lives.
From diabetes prevention for kids and families, to substance use prevention programs, to life-saving automated external defibrillator (AED) placements across Monterey County, your support helps us reach people where they are — often before they ever step into our hospital.
These free community programs reflect our deepest values as a local nonprofit healthcare system. We’re not just treating illness — we’re helping people live longer, healthier lives.
Critical care right at home
Piloted in 2024 thanks to philanthropic funding, Montage Health’s Connected
Care program now provides daily remote vital sign monitoring for patients with heart failure, high blood pressure, and type 2 diabetes — helping clinicians catch issues before they become emergencies.
For one patient, that early detection was life-saving.
A routine remote reading flagged a dangerously low heart rate. Though the patient felt fine, a nurse called to advise him on symptoms to watch for. Later that night when his symptoms changed, he knew to immediately seek care — resulting in an emergency pacemaker being implanted, saving his life.
This program made all the difference. It gave me the warning I needed.
Thanks to the Innovation and Excellence Fund, Montage Health is now home to WASPLab® — a next-generation microbiology system that accelerates laboratory results with round-theclock automation and unprecedented accuracy.
This breakthrough allows clinicians to pinpoint infections faster, tailor antibiotics more precisely, and begin targeted treatment without delay. The result: better outcomes, shorter hospital stays, and a powerful step forward in the fight against antibiotic resistance.
Using robots to enhance human care
Thanks to donor support, Community Hospital welcomed four new team members — Moxi robots.
These helpful “co-bots” handle routine, time-consuming tasks like delivering supplies and medications, freeing up nurses to spend more time where it matters most: with patients.
Philanthropy helped Community Hospital become one of the first in California to adopt this innovative technology.
56,000+ deliveries
31,000+ hours returned to care providers
Building the future of care
Donor investment empowers Montage Health to build and enhance the spaces where exceptional care happens.
When our Breast Care Center outgrew its original home, community champions for women’s health stepped forward. Their generosity built the modern Carol Hatton Breast Care Center — a space thoughtfully designed for comfort and healing. The new center not only upgraded technology, it doubled our capacity to provide personalized, compassionate care. Its location on the Ryan Ranch campus also brings patients closer to other Montage Health services, improving access and care coordination.
From state-of-the-art facilities to breakthrough technology, donor investment makes it possible to build the future of care in our community.
One ripple becomes many
Innovation at Montage Health is about the exponential power of ideas — how a single advancement in care or technology can reverberate outward, changing countless lives. But it’s not just one drop that makes a difference. It’s many. Each donor, each insight, each investment joins with others to create something larger: a wave of progress. Together, we’re shaping a future where healthcare is more precise, more connected, and more human than ever before.
