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Overwhelming Response from the Community Helps The Campaign for Swedish Reach Initial $100,000,000 Goal

Published Date
Author Anne B. Lipke, M.D.

The average gift amount to the Campaign for Swedish was $350. That’s right, $350.

And thanks to the 50,000+ community members who have made gifts to help improve the health and well-being of our region, I am proud to report that The Campaign for Swedish has reached its initial $100,000,000 fundraising goal.

 

On behalf of the 2,000,000 patients who have benefited, thank you.


The Campaign for Swedish began just over five years ago on January 1, 2007 with an ambitious goal of improving the care we provide to patients in some of the most important areas of health care, including women & infants, cardiovascular care, cancer and the neurosciences. And the response from the community has been overwhelming. Here are just a few facts and figures that highlight how much our friends and neighbors value the important role Swedish plays in the overall health of our region:

 

 

  • 40,000 donors who made their first gift to Swedish during the Campaign
  • 50,000+ total donors to the Campaign, with gifts ranging from $1 to $3,000,000
  • 26 gifts of $1,000,000 or more
  • Over $11.8M was given by Swedish’s own physician and physician groups
  • Building on a foundation of generating $7M a year from gifts, Swedish now benefits from nearly $20M annually in community support

But sometimes when you have such an ambitious goal, it’s easy to lose sight of how your own gift of $10, $25, or $100 can make a difference. The Campaign has benefited greatly from these annual gifts, and when pooled together, they can have a dramatic and positive impact on patients. Each year, Swedish receives more than $225,000-from nearly 5,000 donors- in gifts under $100. It receives over $1.2M from 8,800 generous donors who make gifts of $1000 or less.

So why is that important? Many of these gifts mentioned above are unrestricted, meaning Swedish can use them to meet their highest priority needs. Twice each year the Swedish Medical Center Foundation uses these unrestricted gifts to fund its Philanthropy at Work program, which distributes $400,000 annually. This program allows every department across the hospital to apply for grants ranging in size from a few hundred dollars up to $35,000. It’s a way for us to get the donations we receive directly on to the patient floors to benefit the nurses, doctors and other caregivers who are at the patient bedside. Here are just a few of examples of how your pooled gift support has improved patient care:

While we are grateful for the overwhelming support we have received, we are not yet declaring victory. We will continue to rely on support from the community to support some of our most pressing needs. Over the course of the next 15 months, we are entering The Campaign Homestretch. Gift support generated during the Homestretch period will be used to support a wide variety of programs throughout the health care system. Additional support is needed to meet some important, unfinished needs as well as to help meet the increased patient demand that the new programs and services developed during the Campaign helped to create.


On behalf of all of us at Swedish who benefit from your generosity—the doctors, nurses, and ultimately the patients and their families—thank you for helping us reach our initial $100,000,000 goal. Together, we’ll continue to make a lasting impact on the health of our community.