City of Hope is working to recruit about 350 people as it plans to open a new 190,000-square-foot cancer center in Irvine, Calif., in summer 2022, The Orange County Register reported Dec. 29.
Wendy Austin, senior vice president of operations for City of Hope Orange County, told the news outlet that the number includes clinical staff as well as everyone who would have a role in running the new Lennar Foundation Cancer Center, from "folks that are going to be maintaining our landscaping, all the way up through the technicians in the labs and our diagnostic areas, up to the nurses and the physicians."
Four details:
1. City of Hope is still actively recruiting, with about 280 positions unfilled as of mid-December. About a third of physicians who officials hope to hire before the facility opens have been recruited.
"On the director and manager level, we're really just in the process of recruiting those individuals now," Ms. Austin said. "And as soon as we get them on-boarded, and spending a little bit of time up in Duarte [Calif.] to learn the City of Hope way, then those individuals will start recruiting the people who are the direct care providers."
2. Staffing shortages across the nation's healthcare workforce, as well as the specialized roles City of Hope is looking to fill, make the pool of potential candidates especially limited, according to the Register.
3. The new center is meant to eliminate the need for cancer patients in Orange County to travel for advanced care and clinical trial access. In September, City of Hope officials said about 20 percent of county residents diagnosed with cancer leave the community for advanced care and research.
4. The facility is being built at the FivePoint Gateway community in Irvine.