Advocate Condell earns 2012 HHS Gold Medal of Honor for Leadership in Organ Donation

Advocate Condell Medical Center recently earned the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Gold Medal of Honor for its commitment to saving lives through organ and tissue donation. Advocate Condell is one of more than 400 hospitals across the country to have earned this distinction and will be recognized during the 7th Annual National Learning Congress October 4-5, in Grapevine, Texas.

“We are proud to be the recipients of the HHS Gold Medal for our commitment to organ donation,” said Advocate Condell president Dominica Tallarico. “We hold sacred the practice of turning loss into saving lives, and are grateful to all patients and families who have helped to touch so many lives by donating.”

HHS awards the Gold Medal of Honor to hospitals that have achieved organ donation goals established by the Breakthrough Collaborative on Organ Donation in 2003. These include:

• Achieving an organ donation conversion rate of at least 75 percent.

• Achieving a rate of at least 3.75 organs transplanted per donor (OTPD).

• Successfully recovering transplantable organs in at least 10 percent of cases involving donation after circulatory death (DCD).

Gold Medal winners meet or exceed all three goals in the previous two years. In earning a Gold Medal of Honor, Condell achieved an organ donation conversion rate of 93 percent, an OTPD rate of 3.92 percent and a DCD rate of 16.7 percent.

“We are honored to work with so many hospitals that offer such profound services to our communities and help us carry out our mission of saving and enhancing lives through organ and tissue donation,” said Jerry Anderson, President/CEO of Gift of Hope Organ & Tissue Donor Network. "Advocate Condell has demonstrated an extraordinary commitment to increasing the number of organs available and, thereby, giving hope to people in need of lifesaving organ transplants.”

Advocate Condell Medical Center is the only hospital in its region — among 16 other hospitals — to receive the “Gold Medal” designation.