A $40 million gift to UC Irvine from Pimco founder Bill Gross – the biggest individual donation in school history – will be used to expand UCI’s nursing program during a time when skilled nurses will be in short supply.

A new building financed by the donation, to be named after Bill and Sue Gross, will become the fourth School of Nursing in the University of California system. The school has not yet set a time line for construction, officials said Tuesday.

A year ago, nursing journal.org ranked UCI’s Nursing Science program as one of the top 10 programs of its type in the Western United States.

But the school, which offers fully accredited bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees, has been unable to grow because of space constraints. Last fall, just 78 freshmen – less than 4 percent of all applicants – were admitted to the program.

School officials said the new building, and hiring new faculty, will help the program nearly double in size over the next few years.

“It’s going to be a gradual increase, driven by strategic priority,” said Dr. Howard Federoff, UCI’s vice chancellor of health affairs. “We will not place the current program in a bind or overcrowd students.”

The Gross Foundation hopes its contribution to UCI will help solve “some of the most pressing health care needs of our generation,” said Sue Gross, the foundation’s president.

“We expect our support for the nursing school to have a broad impact, as the demand for nurses and their teachers touches the heart of our health care system,” she said.

According to recent figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the country will need more than 1 million new registered nurses by 2022. More nurse practitioners and registered nurses with advanced degrees will be required to cover a looming shortage of primary care physicians.

News of the nursing program’s planned expansion was received “ecstatically” by students, faculty and staff, said Beth Haney, assistant clinical professor in UCI’s nursing science program.

“We’ve all been walking on air today, so happy,” said Haney, past president of the California Association for Nurse Practitioners.

“We’ll be able to increase the numbers of highly trained nurse practitioners who are very much needed to provide quality health care in Orange County, the Inland Empire and beyond,” she added.

UCI is one of the few schools in the area offering advanced nursing degrees. While registered nurses who provide bedside nursing have bachelor’s degrees, nurse practitioners have master’s or doctoral degrees and fill roles similar to primary care physicians, such as conducting advanced physical assessments and writing prescriptions, Haney said.

California is already experiencing a shortage of nurse practitioners, an issue that Haney said has become more acute as millions of people have gained health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

Not having enough nurse practitioners often leads to longer wait times for patients and affects the quality of care they receive, Haney added.

Within the UC system, UCLA and campuses in San Diego and San Francisco have nursing schools while UC Davis is starting its nursing program.

The gift announced Tuesday isn’t the first huge donation from the Gross Family Foundation to UCI. In 2006, the foundation gave $10 million to create a stem cell research center at UCI.

Bill Gross founded Newport Beach-based Pacific Investment Management Co., a global investment firm. He left Pimco to join Janus Capital in 2014.

Contact the writer: 714-796-7909 or dbharath@ocregister.com