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 The award was presented by Richard Hamilton, Partner
Relations Coordinator for Saving Sight's Springfield office. During
the presentation, Hamilton made the following comments.
"In my role, I have the great privilege of working with the staff at
Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital to help facilitate eye donation
for donors at the hospital.
"In 2015, Saving Sight established the Excellence in Eye Donation
Award to honor outstanding partners. It's an award that will be
given to less than 15% of our 220 partner hospitals this year, and I
am thrilled to be here today to present the staff of Abraham Lincoln
Memorial Hospital with its first Excellence in Eye Donation Award.
 "Last year, with the generosity of donors and their loved ones,
eight individuals every day received a cornea transplant through
tissue provided by Saving Sight. Eight people every day escaped a
lifetime of blindness. Parents were enabled to continue watching
their children grow. Men and women returned to lost hobbies or the
independent ways of living they once knew. The gift of sight is an
incredible one donors and their families give, and hospital staff
play a significant role in helping to honor those wishes to make eye
donation possible.
"The staff at Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital have truly been
exceptional partners in our mission to change lives by saving sight.
"(Their) Work helped realize an 82 percent consent rate for
donations last year. In total, 13 donors from the hospital made the
heroic decision to give the gift of sight in 2015 to help others
suffering from severe vision loss. As a result, 23 transplant
recipients can now see better and resume their lives with healthy
vision.
"In recognition of Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital's outstanding
partnership with Saving Sight to facilitate eye donation, it is my
great privilege to present the entire staff at Abraham Lincoln
Memorial Hospital, with Saving Sight's Excellence in Eye Donation
Award."
Staff on hand to accept the award were Emergency Department Manager,
Tara Morris; Director of Nursing, Jeanne Dennis; Nursing Operations
Manager, Val Cooper; Acute Care Manager, Michelle Green; and
Perioperative Services Manager, Lexanne Darwent. Hospitals in
Saving Sight’s service area of Missouri, Kansas and Illinois that
achieved an eye donation consent rate exceeding 45 percent with at
least ten donors during the 2015 calendar year are being awarded the
honor this year. Fewer than 15 percent of Saving Sight’s partner
hospitals will receive the Excellence in Eye Donation Award in this
year.
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“We applaud Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital for empowering others to give the
gift of sight and for striving to create a culture that supports donation,” said
Tony Bavuso, CEO of Saving Sight. “Thanks to the generosity of eye donors and
their families, and the staff at Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital, more people
than ever were able to receive a sight-saving cornea transplant last year.”
Each year around 48,000 individuals in the United States require a cornea
transplant to restore vision that has been lost due to disease, disorder or
injury. With the help of hospital partners like Abraham Lincoln Memorial
Hospital, Saving Sight provided corneas for more than 3,000 of those transplant
surgeries in 2015. For more information on becoming an eye, organ and tissue
donor, please visit donatelife.net.
About Saving Sight
Saving Sight is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with a mission to change
lives by saving sight. Founded in Columbia, Mo. in 1960, the organization
introduced eye donation and the gift of sight to Missouri. Today, Saving Sight
operates community healthy vision programs that serve more than 100,000 people
worldwide each year with offices located in Missouri, Kansas, and central
Illinois. For more information, please visit saving-sight.org.
About Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital
Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital is a 25-bed critical access hospital located
at 200 Stahlhut Drive in Lincoln, Illinois. ALMH is an affiliate of Memorial
Health System. For more information, please visit ALMH.org
[Information recieved from Angela
Stoltzenburg, ALMH and Nicole Flood, Saving Sight] |
