Dr. Herbert Pardes, a psychiatrist and former director of the National Institute of Mental Health who brought order to the merger of two major medical centers that became NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, which it operated for 11 years, died April 30 at his home. . In Manhattan. He was 89 years old.
Her son Steve said the cause was aortic stenosis.
Dr. Pardes (pronounced par-dis) was named president and chief executive officer of New York Hospital and Presbyterian Hospital in late 1999, nearly two years after the hospital's merger. For the previous 10 years, he had served as medical director of Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons, a Presbyterian-affiliated medical school.
“As medical director, it was no secret that I didn't always agree with hospital management,” he told New York City TV in 2011 in a thick Bronx accent. This is to run a hospital. ”
The merger created one of the nation's largest healthcare organizations with 2,369 beds, 13,000 employees, and $1.6 billion in annual revenue. It has 167 facilities, stretching from Manhattan to Rockland and Orange counties in New York state. Those hospitals include Weill's Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan.
“This was a surprisingly successful merger given the different cultures of both institutions,” Kenneth E. Laske, president of the Greater New York Hospital Association, an industry group, said in an interview. “He was the bridge that enabled that organization to have a smooth, wrinkle-free transition.”
But Alan Sager, a health law professor at Boston University, would not comment on the New York-Presbyterian merger, saying in an email: Not ourselves. But if the merger were to reduce costs (which has not been proven), rather than lower premiums, it would likely result in higher hospital surpluses. ”
Dr. Pardes aimed to make NewYork-Presbyterian a model of health care with a focus on patients, efficient management, and tight financial controls. He made bedside visits, insisted that nurses memorize the names of patients and their families, and ordered rooms and lobbies to be painted in soothing colors.
“I've never been able to get over a problem,” he reportedly said in a 2007 profile of himself in The New York Times. This profession is all about helping patients survive. This is always the case. Unfortunately, I think we sometimes lose sight of that. ”
“Herb dealt with life's problems with a childlike smile and a dash of borscht-belt humor,” Laske said.
Dr. Pardes has helped raise millions of dollars for NewYork-Presbyterian Church, Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital, Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart Center, Iris Cantor Men's Women's Health Center, and more. He helped raise donations from millionaires to build the facility. , all located in Manhattan.
“He had a way of interacting with people in power and convincing them to make huge gifts,” Steve Pardes said.
Herbert Pardes was born on July 7, 1934 in the Bronx and raised primarily in Lakewood, New Jersey. His parents, Luis and Frances (Bergman) Pardes, owned the Hotel Greenwood in Lakewood. The hotel was converted into a nursing home in the late 1950s. , ran a resort in the borscht region of the Catskill Mountains.
At the age of seven, Herbert was diagnosed with Perthes disease, a rare childhood disease that temporarily cuts off the blood supply to the bulb of the hip joint, weakening the bones. Although he recovered with no residual symptoms, he was hospitalized for 10 months with his entire body in a cast. Strict doctors inserted needles into him without explanation, he recalled, and hospital regulations limited his parents' visits to just an hour several times a week. Although this experience traumatized him, decades later it motivated him to be more attentive to his patients.
As a young man, he worked for his parents and observed how they pampered guests at their resort. He sold soda for his dime, raised war funds, worked as a bellhop, waited tables, and worked his way up to the maitre d'hotel.
“The dining room was the epitome of eccentricity, a great behavioral laboratory for a would-be psychiatrist,” Dr. Pardes told the Times in 2003.
He graduated from Rutgers University in 1956 with a bachelor's degree and received his medical degree in 1960 from SUNY Downstate Medical College (now SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University) in Brooklyn. He served his internship and psychiatry residency at Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn from his 1960 to his 1962 years.
After being drafted into the Army, Dr. Pardes ran a mental health clinic at Fort Myer in Arlington, Virginia from 1962 to 1964. He was discharged from the military, completed his training in 1966, and graduated from the New York Psychoanalytic Institute in 1970.
He spent most of the next two decades building a career centered around mental health, serving as chair of psychiatry at Downstate University, chair of psychiatry at the University of Colorado Medical Center in Denver, and director of the research-intensive NIMH. program.
In 1984, Dr. Pardes was appointed Chair of the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University Irving Medical Center and Chair of the Department of Psychiatry in the College of Physicians and Surgeons. Five years later, he was named the university's vice president for health sciences and dean of medicine, taking on the role of managing the combined NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
In addition to his son Steve, he is survived by two other sons, James and Lawrence, six grandchildren, and his partner, Dr. Nancy Wexler, a professor of neuropsychology in the College of Physicians and Surgeons. left behind. A large family in Venezuela had been suffering from Huntington's disease for 20 years. She herself suffers from the disease. He has been estranged from his wife, Judith (Silver) Pardes, since the 1980s. She passed away in 2022.
Dr. Pardes continued to serve as a well-paid nonprofit board member even after stepping down as president and chief executive officer in 2011. He was later named executive vice chairman of the hospital's board of trustees, a position that compensation experts say is rare in the nonprofit world. , according to a 2014 Times article.
In 2011, his last year running the hospital, he earned $4.1 million (equivalent to about $5.8 million today). Then, as executive vice chairman, he received $5.5 million, including $2 million in deferred compensation in 2012. It received at least $2 million each year through 2022.
In a 2014 statement, Frank Benack Jr., the hospital's board president at the time, told the Times in a 2014 statement that Dr. He said he was held back because of this.
Dr. Stephen J. Corwin will succeed him and remain in that position.
Steve Pardes said the focus on compensation bothered his father. “Comparing yourself to CEOs of profitable businesses may have undervalued your compensation,” Pardes said. “But he wasn't concerned about money. He wanted to be paid a fair wage for his contributions.”