Advocate Christ Medical Center Plays Key Role in $29.5 Million Increase

Advocate Christ Medical Center/Hope Children's Hospital in Oak Lawn, Ill. played an instrumental role in Advocate Health Care's delivery of $373 million in charitable care and services during 2008. This total, detailed in Advocate's annual Community Benefits Report recently filed with the state of Illinois, represents a $29.5 million increase from the Advocate system's 2007 community-related contributions.

Advocate's community benefits investment allows it to meet the health and wellness needs of its communities and expands access to care.  The 8.6 percent increase from 2007's total underscores the dedication of Advocate physicians, nurses and associates to provide for the underserved and vulnerable.

Advocate is a not-for-profit, faith-based health care system and the largest health care provider in Illinois.  It operates more than 200 sites of care in the Chicago metropolitan area; among them nine acute care hospitals and two children's hospitals.

"Advocate is proud to report our continuing commitment to providing substantial, and vital, care and service to our communities," said Jim Skogsbergh, president and CEO of Advocate Health Care.  "Our $373 million community benefit contribution in 2008 illustrates Advocate's healing mission and dedication to meeting the needs of those that we are so privileged to serve."

Advocate provided $32.4 million in free and discounted charity care for the uninsured and underinsured, and supplied more than $228 million in care without full reimbursement from Medicare, Medicaid or other government-sponsored programs.  In 2008, these benefits alone totaled $260 million in health care service costs.

In addition to free and subsidized health care, Advocate and its nine acute care hospitals and two children's hospitals, including Christ Medical Center and Hope Children's Hospital, also offer programs and services that respond to communities' unique needs.  These programs encompass health and wellness screenings, behavioral health services, and school-based health care.  Advocate sites also provide language assistance services, such as interpreters and non-English patient education materials.

Among the community benefits provided by Christ Medical Center/Hope Children's Hospital are:

• Comprehensive, Level I trauma services, providing lifesaving treatments and care to the most severely injured patients.  The medical center serves as one of the largest Level I trauma centers in the Midwest.
• Ongoing partnership with and financial support for CeaseFire to reduce incidents of violence on Chicago streets
• The Ronald McDonald Care Mobile, a 40-foot, mobile pediatric medical clinic which is driven to underserved neighborhoods in order to provide at-risk children  with the kinds of health services that they would not otherwise receive due to lack of health insurance, unavailable transportation and other socioeconomic factors.
• Live...from the Heart, an educational partnership between the medical center and Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry to give high school and junior high school students the opportunity to expand their scope of learning beyond the classroom setting.  The curriculum affords participants the experience of viewing live, real-time heart surgery and conversing with the surgical team during the operation through closed-circuit, two-way interactive Web feed.
• Partnerships with several children's museums, including the Oak Lawn Children's Museum and the KidsWork Children's Museum in Frankfort, to achieve the hospital's vision to inspire and motivate all children to attain their full potential in the fields of science, technology, engineering and medicine. Hope Children's Hospital has provided funding to establish health-related exhibits and learning opportunities at all three museums, as well as on-site community educational events and health fairs. Collectively these partnerships will impact more than 100,000 visitors to the museums annually.
• Nursing Summer Camp, a free program that gives students entering their final year of high school a chance to learn more about the nursing profession and to shadow nurses working in a wide range of areas within the hospital.
• Annual health fairs, such as the medical center's spring health and safety fair, and dozens of free community health screenings, including skin cancer, prostate cancer and colorectal cancer screenings.

"Despite these financially challenging times, Christ Medical Center and Hope Children's Hospital remains committed to investing in our communities and extending our healing ministry throughout the south and southwest region," said medical center president, Kenneth Lukhard.  "Our goal is to make a positive impact on the health and well-being of the individuals and families whom we are so privileged to serve.  We achieve that goal by ensuring everyone access to our services."

Advocate Health Care's 2008 donations, such as contributions of equipment, supplies and clinic space, increased 20 percent over 2007.  And, the system increased its provision of medical education and training by more than $3.5 million.

Advocate, its hospitals and all its care sites are able to provide these substantial benefits in diverse communities, in large part, due to the system's tax exempt not-for-profit status.  This flexibility, established through a continuing partnership with state and local governments, allows Advocate's sites of care to deploy health care services and programs tailored to the health and wellness needs of individual communities.

About Advocate Christ Medical Center/Hope Children's Hospital

Located at 4440 W. 95th Street in Oak Lawn, Ill., Advocate Christ Medical Center/Hope Children's Hospital is a 695-bed, world-class institution that is part of the Advocate Health Care system.  Now in its 48th year, the medical center is the Chicago area's largest and most comprehensive provider of cardiac care, nationally recognized for its use of innovative technologies and advanced procedures in the treatment of heart disease and stroke.  Cancer care, neurosciences, pediatrics, care of high-risk mothers and infants, women's health services and general surgery are other specialties for which the medical center is noted.

About Advocate Health Care

Advocate Health Care, a nationally-ranked health system, is the largest health care provider in Illinois. Advocate operates more than 200 sites of care across metropolitan Chicago, including nine acute care hospitals, two children's hospitals, four Level I trauma centers (the state's highest designation in trauma care), a home health care company and one of the region's largest medical groups. As a not-for-profit, mission-based health system affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the United Church of Christ, Advocate contributed more than $373 million in charitable care and services to communities across Chicagoland in 2008.