It was a riveting story, and as businessman and philanthropist Henry Gluck listened, his conviction grew that he needed to do something to bring this recent innovation he was hearing about to the Los Angeles region. A patient had suffered a hemorrhagic stroke, a sudden bleeding into the brain, and a highly specialized ambulance with equipment and staff trained to manage such cerebrovascular events had been dispatched. The medical team acted quickly to assess the patient, using a compact CT scanner in the vehicle to pinpoint the location of the bleed. They inserted IVs and prepped the patient with contrast and other necessary protocols so that he would be ready for treatment when they got to the hospital. Such rapid response is essential; for every minute that ticks by as the brain is deprived of blood, an average of 2 million brain neurons die, which can lead to permanent incapacity, brain damage or death.
Gluck also watched a video of a life-saving procedure on a patient who had been transported after suffering an ischemic stroke, one involving a clot. The result, he recalls, was near miraculous. “The second he opens his eyes and starts talking, everyone starts applauding. It was immediate,” he says. “That was really rewarding.”
Witnessing the real-time impact of a rapid-response stroke unit impressed Gluck beyond words. “How can I not support this?” he says firmly.
When Gluck was approached by UCLA Health leadership about making a foundational gift to bring such a program to UCLA, he first talked it over with his family — his wife, Arline (who passed away in March after 71 years of marriage); their daughter, Tracey; and son, Ron. The choice was clear, he recalls. “We were already involved in so many causes. But I said to them, ‘The stroke thing is different. We are going to be involved in something with the knowledge of it saving lives every day.’ I explained to them the emotional significance, and that if someone is suffering from a stroke and they call 911 we go there even if they are on the street.”
It didn’t take long for the family to decide they wanted to help UCLA Health launch a rapid-response stroke program in Los Angeles, and the Arline and Henry Gluck Stroke Rescue Program — the first program of its kind in California — was established in 2017.
Now, hardly a week goes by that someone doesn’t mention to him that they saw the program’s mobile stroke unit, says Gluck, the founding and current chair of the UCLA Health System Board. “Every time somebody tells me that, I know that there’s a life that’s being saved,” Gluck says. “My family and I will never know who, and we will never see the results, but we’ll know it’s making a difference. I don’t know what else you can do where you get that immediate satisfaction. It gives me and my family a lot of joy because our name is on that vehicle,” Gluck says, noting his wife would be proud of the program’s ongoing work.
And it’s not just about saving lives, but also preserving quality of life, says Tracey Gluck, managing director of the Gluck Group for J.P. Morgan. The quick response helps survivors avoid potential paralysis, brain damage and speech loss. “To see a patient receive treatment within minutes is amazing,” Tracey Gluck says. “There are situations where people can’t move their arms and the team does its work in the mobile stroke unit to get treatment started, and then at the hospital they use the instrument to go up the groin through the blood vessels to pinch out the clot, and all of a sudden the person’s moving their arm.”
Henry Gluck, a former CEO of Caesars World who helped bring the first upscale shopping mall to the Las Vegas Strip, recites stroke statistics with the passion and ease of a businessman who is deeply committed to his investment. The factoid that resonates with him most: One in every four individuals in the U.S. will, at some point in their life, suffer a stroke. “That is huge,” he says. “That’s an incredible statistic.”
“My mission, before I write the final chapter, is to blanket the city with these specialized stroke units.”
And it’s one that hits close to home. In 1969, Gluck’s father died at the age of 70 after suffering a series of strokes. “We lost him relatively early — they didn’t know much in those days,” Gluck, who is 96 years old, says wistfully. “Medicine is exponential. The advancement of today is beyond the way they dealt with it then. The medications available, the expertise we have today, the education about lifestyle. All of it is part of a formula to discourage strokes.”
Both father and daughter continue to actively spread the word about stroke awareness, and they say this meaningful work with the stroke program is a permanent piece of their lives. In May 2023, as part of National Stroke Awareness Month, they were invited to throw out the ceremonial first pitch at Dodger Stadium. And the UCLA mobile stroke unit was on hand in the parking lot at the stadium entrance, as well. “People were enamored with it,” Tracey Gluck says. “They’d never seen anything like this. The exciting thing now,” she adds, “is that there are two more units coming.”
Philanthropy remains essential to the UCLA Arline and Henry Gluck Stroke Rescue Program and the expansion of its lifesaving work. The Glucks continue to network to recruit new donors and work behind-the-scenes to help overcome regulatory complexities and other red tape.
“My mission, before I write the final chapter, is to blanket the city with these specialized stroke units,” Henry Gluck says, “particularly in those areas where there is a lower socioeconomic status and a higher prevalence of strokes.”
Adds Tracey Gluck: “I know that my involvement is helping save lives today, tomorrow, the next day. It doesn’t matter what time or what day of the week, it’s about helping people, and that’s a great feeling to have.”
Marina Dundjerski is a Los Angeles-based writer and author of UCLA: The First Century.
