Dignity Health named No. 1 Performer in Health Care Philanthropy

(May 2017) -- In February, Dignity Health was again ranked among the top 10 high-performing health care fundraisers in North America by the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy (AHP) -- the second year in a row that Dignity Health had earned this distinction. 

We are honored to update that news to share that out of the top 52 high-performing fundraisers in the U.S. and Canada included in this AHP report, Dignity Health Philanthropy was ranked No. 1.

In an article in Becker’s Hospital Review published on May 31, the top 10 organizations were ranked as follows:

1. Dignity Health (San Francisco)
2. Children's Hospital Los Angeles
3. Seattle Children's Hospital
4. Sutter Health (Sacramento)
5. Miami Children's Health System
6. Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center (Winston-Salem, NC)
7. Boston Medical Center
8. Hoag Hospital (Newport Beach, CA)
9. UMass School of Medicine (Shrewsberry, MA)
10. MedStar Health (Columbia, MD)

A representative from AHP confirmed the ranking and explained that in order to determine what factors lead to higher performance among participants in the AHP Report on Giving survey, additional analysis was done on institutions with the highest levels of net production returns.

High performers represent the reporting organizations in the top 25 percentile for net production returns. Key indicators included revenue, cost per dollar raised, and return on investment.

As compared with all of the organizations surveyed, the high performing organizations reported key differences including less focus on annual gifts and special events and more focus on major giving, and allocating more resources to research and less to capital equipment.

High-performing health care organizations in the U.S. reported net fundraising revenue nearly seven times higher than for all other institutions.

Dignity Health has 31 foundations across its service areas in Arizona, California and Nevada that provide essential fundraising support to assist in realizing its mission of providing compassionate, patient-centered care on an individual level.

Last year Dignity Health Philanthropy collectively raised nearly $113 million to support areas including community outreach, general capital, mission services and research, among others.

Dignity Health Philanthropy’s goal is to continue to increase fundraising annually by a minimum of 7 percent, with the ultimate goal of reaching over $250 million raised annually.

AHP is a not-for-profit, international professional organization dedicated exclusively to development professionals who encourage charity in North America's health care organizations. It has 5,000 members representing more than 2,200 health care facilities.