Real estate developer Donald Zucker pledges $10M in matching gift for Good Samaritan hospital's neonatal unit

The largest gift in Good Samaritan University Hospital history — a $10 million matching commitment from the foundation of real estate developer Donald Zucker and his wife, Barbara — will go to the neonatal intensive care unit.

"This is a historic milestone for Good Samaritan and Catholic Health," Dr. Justin Lundbye, Good Samaritan president, said in an interview. Catholic Health runs the West Islip hospital. The money will go toward medical equipment and construction of respite areas and private rooms for families with infants in the unit. 

Good Samaritan's NICU is the only one on Suffolk County's South Shore equipped to provide Level III care, according to the hospital. That level of care is generally reserved for infants who are born severely preterm, weighing about 3.3 pounds or less, who may need advanced respiratory support and monitoring. Level III units may also provide social services and pastoral care.

The unit treats about 500 infant patients a year, some as small as an adult's fist, Lundbye said. "It's a scary time, probably the hardest time in [parents'] lives, and it's a time when they want to have that highest level of expertise," he said. 

The Zuckers did not comment on Thursday, but in a news release from the hospital announcing the gift, Barbara Hrbek Zucker said the couple’s own granddaughter had received treatment in a neonatal intensive care unit. (It was not Good Samaritan's, hospital officials confirmed.)

"She needed specialized care to help her get a strong start. Thanks to her NICU team, she is now a thriving little girl, and we feel so fortunate that she got the right care. My husband and I want to ensure that service is available to Long Island’s South Shore community by supporting the NICU at Good Samaritan," she said in the release.

The Zuckers’ Good Samaritan gift establishes a dollar-for-dollar challenge to encourage additional philanthropic support, and Catholic Health said on Thursday it was seeking the first $2.5 million in commitments by the year’s end. Lundbye said the total cost for all the improvements hospital leaders hope to make would likely reach $20 million to $30 million. 

The Zuckers previously gave $61 million to the medical school founded by Hofstra University and Northwell Health, which was renamed the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell in 2017.

Donald Zucker, of Sands Point, founded Donald Zucker Co., a Midtown-based firm that builds, buys and manages apartment and retail properties. The company, which started as a mortgage brokerage in 1961, has since developed nearly 30 buildings — a mix of rental, condo, co-op and retail — and acquired roughly 3,000 additional apartments, according to a 2016 profile in The Real Deal, an industry publication.

By Nicholas Spangler

nicholas.spangler@newsday.comspanglernewsday

Nicholas Spangler is a general assignment reporter and has worked at Newsday since 2010.