So seemingly humdrum are the operations of Mission Outreach that one of the most difficult tasks for chief executive officer Bruce Compton is creating promotional materials. “Beyond taking a picture of some guy’s back while he’s loading a truck,” little can really capture the significance of the work going on at the facility, he says. On the surface, Compton is right — there’s nothing awe-inspiring about the place. Millions of tons of usable medical supplies are discarded annually when manufacturers introduce new product lines or when healthcare facilities make upgrades or go out of business.
Not only does the equipment take up space in landfills, the trashed electronic components contain lead, mercury, cadmium, chromium, arsenic, asbestos, nickel and copper that, if incinerated, can contaminate the soil or air.
Meanwhile, doctors in developing countries throughout the world desperately need supplies that can save lives. Already faced with immense economic challenges and the scourge of diseases like malaria and AIDS, citizens of poorest regions of the world are becoming more dependent on medical donations.
In fact, the World Health Organization estimates that as much as 80 percent of all healthcare supplies in some countries are donated. At the same time, the WHO also believes that approximately 40 percent of donated items are unusable when they are received.
Generosity can also be a mixed blessing, Compton learned. Before coming to Springfield, he worked at a clinic in Jeremie, Haiti as a financial
administrator. The clinic was flush with donations but it often
received equipment that was broken or so high-tech that workers didn’t
know how to use it. So when he helped found Mission Outreach,
it became a top priority to ensure that supplies are working and in
good condition when they leave the warehouse. That’s why the mission
goes through painstaking steps to see that the surgical sutures haven’t
expired, X-ray machine light bulbs work, or that they’re not sending an
MRI machine to a clinic that doesn’t even have electricity.
Every donation is also bar-coded so that shipments can be tracked anywhere on the five continents, excluding Australia and Antarctica, where the mission has sent donations. Mission Outreach is by no means the largest nonprofit or commercial organization that recycles medical equipment, but few others pay as much attention to detail on the front end, Compton says. Because word is spreading about the quality of its work, the mission is growing by leaps and bounds. Since last year, the mission has purchased a semi and hired two full-time employees, bringing the total to six. In the first six months of the current fiscal year alone, the mission has more than doubled the value of its shipments, sending out $3.5 million in supplies over the previous fiscal year’s total of $3.1 million.
Mission Outreach became a distinct entity in 2006, separate from the Hospital Sisters, who run St. John’s Hospital in Springfield along with several other hospitals throughout Illinois and Wisconsin. Since then, the mission has shipped supplies weighing 1.1 million pounds and valued at $8.2 million to 43 different countries.
“We’ve really pumped up the volume,” Compton says. “The demand for what we do is growing. We have to find more supplies to give to people.” If things go as planned, the mission will open a second location in Chicago by June 2009, putting the mission closer to hospitals that want to donate as well as freight companies and rail lines.
“We have some success stories. When we ship a container, we ask what we could do better and a lot of times the answer is nothing,” Compton says. his is job security right here. The pay