the giving effect  2025      19 
What is an endowed chair —  
and why does it matter now?
A permanent engine for innovation
As Stuckey retires, the system is establishing the Dr. Thomas 
D. Stuckey Endowed Chair in Cardiovascular Medicine — not to 
commemorate one career, but to ensure the innovation continues 
long after he leaves the cath lab. An endowed chair is the highest 
honor a health system can offer a physician leader. Unlike annual 
funding or temporary grants, an endowed chair creates a permanent 
source of support — invested once and generating resources every 
year. The income from that investment provides physician-scientists 
with protected time to pursue the work that fuels breakthroughs. 
For Cone Health, the Stuckey Endowed Chair is more than a 
recognition of a career. It is the first endowed chair in Cone Health’s 
history — a public commitment to staying ahead of the curve and 
maintaining our position as a national leader in heart and vascular 
innovation.
By fully funding the chair, donors make it possible to:
Recruit and retain top physicians from leading programs nationwide
Accelerate clinical trials that bring promising treatments to our 
community sooner
Expand prevention and education programs that reduce heart 
disease across generations
An endowed chair ensures that the future of heart and vascular 
care is led by visionaries — the next Tom Stuckey, drawn here not by 
chance, but by design.
When you support the endowed chair, you invest in more than a 
leader. You invest in the lives of every neighbor whose heart beats 
stronger because world-class care exists right here, close to home.
2021–2024
Cone Health receives its largest 
philanthropic contribution to date, 
a $3 million leadership gift from 
Norman and Sylvia Samet in 2022, to 
lead a major expansion of heart and 
vascular care.
A $200+ million heart and vascular 
investment fuels major expansions at 
Moses Cone Hospital and Alamance 
Regional Medical Center, adding 
new cath labs — including the Dr. 
Steven Klein Cath Lab — modernized 
care environments and a dedicated 
rehabilitation facility: the Cone 
Health Leonard J. Kaplan Center for 
Heart, Vascular & Lung Health.
2025
The Steven D. Bell Family Heart & 
Vascular Center opens on the Moses 
Cone campus, bringing diagnostics, 
clinic visits, imaging, procedures 
and pharmacy together in a five-
story, 156,000-square-foot facility 
supported in part by the largest 
philanthropic gift in Cone Health 
history. The year also marks the 
dedication of the Norman & Sylvia 
Samet Family Lobby, recognizing the 
Samets’ leadership generosity.

View this content as a flipbook by clicking here.