BGU | MY PATH, Haim Doron, MD

While serving as medical director of Clalit, I reached an agreement with the director-general of the Ministry of Health, Prof. Baruch Padeh, that all the government-run and Clalit maternity hospitals that until then had operated as separate entities would be moved and incorporated within the country’s general hospitals. The logic behind this decision was that at the general hospitals, one could provide a higher standard of medical treatment, which particularly in emergency situations, could lower mortality rates of mothers and infants. Among the maternity facilities that were closed was the facility in Kfar Saba, which was moved to the Meir Hospital premises. In the old building that had housed the maternity hospital, we would establish a geriatrics department. Today it houses an off-site geriatric hospitalization ward that operates under Meir’s geriatric department and a regional clinic that serves the Sharon area. As for acting on the decision, we couldn’t relocate the old maternity hospital to be within the Meir campus without first constructing a new building to house it. But I didn’t have a budget for this purpose. So, I turned to Yaakov Levinson, the head of the Bank Hapoalim, the Labor Federation- controlled bank. At the time, Levinson was in the USA on bank business; and I asked him to help me find a donor for this purpose. Levinson gave me the name of Louis Stulberg, head of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union. 78 Stulberg agreed to donate three million dollars to build a maternity ward at the Meir Hospital. Levinson, however, had a proviso . He required that the hospital be renamed for Pinchas Sapir, who was a resident of Kfar Saba and a mentor of Yaakov Levinson. Levinson wanted to use this opportunity to honor his mentor on his home turf. Meir Hospital, however, was already named for someone else. On the one hand, I couldn’t deliver the goods without hurting the Meir family; on the other hand, I had to secure this donation to establish the maternity wing. I devised a solution: Meir Hospital would continue to bear the name Meir; but the geriatric hospital in the old maternity hospital in Kfar Saba, the Shalvata mental hospital in Hod Hasharon, the Loewenstein Rehabilitation Hospital in Ra’anana, all the community-based clinics in the Sharon area, and the Meir Hospital, as well, would be amalgamated under the name Sapir Medical Center. The Meir family wasn’t thrilled, but they didn’t protest vigorously. Thus, I secured the donation and built the maternity wards that were so essential to the area. A word would be apt at this juncture about naming hospitals according to donors’ wishes. I’m not a great believer in the sticking power of name changes following a substantial donation. For example: Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, originally Ichilov Hospital, was renamed formally the Sourasky Medical Center. While this exists on paper, how is Ichilov hospital called today in the public mind? Ichilov! Beilinson hospital was renamed the Rabin Medical Center. How is it called today by the average Israeli? Beilinson! The Sharon area hospital was named after Golda Meir, because we collected funds in America to build it, leveraged by promising to call the hospital after Golda Meir. This was a source of pride to the donors, as Golda Meir was American Jewry’s most eminent figure among the generation of the country’s builders and founders. How is it called today? The Sharon Hospital! In short, renaming maneuvers don’t seem to work. The weight of tradition usually prevails. Beilinson Hospital in Petach Tikva Beilinson Hospital, constructed in 1936, was the second hospital that Clalit built. Dr. Moshe Beilinson 79 was a physician, journalist, and philosophical mind within Labor Zionism. From its 78 Founded in 1900 by Jewish garment workers, many of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILWGU) leaders were Jewish and had an especially close relationship with Israel’s Federation of Labor. They occasionally helped mobilize donations for establishing health institutions in Israel, including not just this instance but also Soroka Hospital in Beer Sheva. https://boydellandbrewer. com/9781580462792/health-and-zionism/ pp. 240-261. 79 Dr. Moshe Beilinson (1889-1936) was born in Russia and studied medicine at universities in Moscow, Freiburg, and Basel. In 1924, he immigrated to Israel and settled in Petach Tikva. In 1925, with the founding of Davar newspaper, he joined the editorial staff at the invitation of editor Berl Katznelson. Beilinson became the Israeli labor movement’s chief spokesperson, expressing in his writings the position of a principled individual, including fierce criticism of British Mandate policies. He was the initiator behind establishment of the “Hospital for the Moshavot in Judea and the Sharon,” and after his death, it was named Beilinson Hospital. Today, it is the Beilinson campus of the Rabin Medical Center.

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