Catholic Health World

CHA director to coordinate international relief efforts among ministry members

Bruce Compton, an administrator skilled in bringing surplus medical supplies from the Midwest to medical missions in developing nations, will join CHA April 1 as senior director of international outreach.

In this newly created position, Compton will work to enhance the collaboration of ministry members involved in health care outreach activities in the developing world in order to reduce waste and increase the impact of those efforts.

"This is an exciting development in CHA's history," said Sr. Carol Keehan, DC, the association's president and chief executive officer. "Given the human suffering in Haiti, this effort to maximize the impact of the ministry's international health care outreach comes at a fortuitous time. CHA members are committed to helping rebuild the health care infrastructure in Haiti without neglecting the needs of other developing nations."

Compton is the founding president and chief executive of Springfield, Ill.-based Hospital Sisters Mission Outreach. The organization collects surplus supplies and equipment from hospitals in Missouri, Illinois and Wisconsin and ships the goods to missions in 50 countries.

Mission Outreach started eight years ago after Compton returned from two years in Haiti, where he worked for the Haitian Health Foundation. It was not uncommon for medical supplies and other charitable contributions to lay unclaimed on the Port-au-Prince docks, a supply chain breakdown Compton attributed to poor communication and an uncoordinated delivery and distribution chain.

With the support of the Hospital Sisters congregation, Compton built an efficient supply chain, filling orders from missions rather than packing pallets with unsolicited surplus goods not needed by the recipient. Mission Outreach soon outgrew its garage space at the motherhouse of the Hospital Sisters in Springfield. It operates warehouses in Springfield and Chicago.

The organization will be under interim management during an executive search for Compton's replacement.

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