Ruvo Center offers potential as vast as the human mind

As the Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health prepares to open its doors officially, take a moment to consider its impact.

Not just on one corner of downtown Las Vegas, but on the entire Southern Nevada community and well beyond.

In a few short years the Ruvo Center has gone from the dream of a grieving son to a reality I believe marks a defining moment in our valley. What The Mirage did for the Strip's image, the Ruvo Center promises to do for the Las Vegas medical community. That makes it easily among the most important buildings ever to take shape here.

And what a shape it is.

The Frank Gehry design is already raising pulses, eyebrows and blood pressure among architecture critics and public art aficionados. Some love it, some hate it. No one ignores it.

Sounds like a winner to me.

Thanks to Mayor Oscar Goodman's tenacity as the maitre d' of downtown redevelopment and liquor company executive Larry Ruvo's audacious vision, the center has rapidly evolved from concept to crescendo.

It all started in 1992 when Ruvo's father, Lou Ruvo, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. The son watched the cruel toll the disease took on his father and the family. Lou Ruvo died in 1994.

Fast forward. The doors of the Ruvo Center are opening.

"I've just been walking around this last two weeks as we're getting ready for the opening," Larry Ruvo said Thursday. "Yes, the dream has come true, but I want to make certain my own family struggle was not in vain.

"I believe this center for brain health will produce miracles not just for Las Vegas and Nevada, but for the entire world because of what we're doing with these symposiums. We're bringing doctors in from all over the world, major world leaders."

Ruvo attributes much of the attention the center has received to Gehry's creativity and the inspiration of his father's neurologist, Dr. Leon Thal. That effort is already paying dividends by attracting Dr. Jeffrey Cummings, a world leader in the treatment of Alzheimer's.

"To have a man of this international stature moving to our city, it's extraordinary," Ruvo said. "It's amazing to me that I believe the epicenter for these brain diseases will be in Las Vegas."

The best way to begin to appreciate the Ruvo Center is to drive by and see it for yourself. It's at 888 W. Bonneville Ave. Although dwarfed by the World Market Center, it's impossible to miss.

What's going on inside matters most.

If you had suggested such sea changes were possible only a few years ago in Las Vegas, you would have been asked to have your head examined. Trouble is, you might have had to travel outside Southern Nevada to get that exam. But no longer.

The Ruvo Center, with its Cleveland Clinic affiliation, is not only a victory for downtown redevelopment. It also figures to improve the quality of life of thousands of people in the coming years. And, Ruvo said, he anticipates it will be a linchpin for Las Vegas to emerge as a leader in medical tourism. The center has already attracted patients from 16 states.

The fact Gehry designed the building also makes it a work of architecture that will be studied by graduate students for generations. Like the best poetry, the architectural sound of the Ruvo Center echoes the sense of its mission.

With that, I propose a community toast to the Ruvo Center.

Here's hoping you never need to walk through its doors other than to gawk at its design and thank the fellow who turned his dream into reality.

But if you should ever need it, won't you be glad it's here?

Have an item for the Bard of the Boulevard? E-mail comments and contributions to Smith@reviewjournal.com or call (702) 383-0295. He also blogs at lvrj.com/blogs/smith.