$1M donation to Northwell funding fellowship for internists

A $1 million donation to Northwell Health from the late George Gottridge is funding a program designed to train future health care leaders at the health system.

Northwell said Tuesday the goal of the Libby Gottridge Endowed Fellowship in General Internal Medicine is to prepare general internists for successful careers in education, research and patient care. Northwell added that the fellowship runs for two years. 

Dr. Amanda Simone, an internal medicine resident at North Shore University Hospital and Long Island Jewish Medical Center, is the first fellow.

Simone will facilitate workshops in community health, develop a mentoring group for female residents and engage in medical education research. She will share her findings through presentations at national and regional conferences, and will submit manuscripts to peer-reviewed journals.

Gottridge, who died in April at the age of 93, was a World War II veteran from Plainview. He endowed the fellowship in honor of his late wife, Lenore, who died in 2017.

In 2017, his wife’s philanthropy supported 46 different organizations.

Their daughter, Dr. Joanne Gottridge, is senior vice president of medicine at Northwell.

New Hyde Park-based Northwell Health, with 70,000 employees, is the largest private employer in the state.