The Montana Hospital Association (MHA) has named Bina Eggensperger of Thompson Falls as the association's 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award honoree.

"Bina has invested in healthcare in various ways for a very, very long time. Without people like Bina, small hospitals couldn't continue to exist in these rural communities we have in Montana," said Dr. Gregory Hanson, CEO of Clark Fork Valley Hospital. Eggensperger, has been on the CFVH board since January of 1986, with the exception of a few years off. She was nominated by a CEO from another Montana hospital, supporting her efforts not only locally, but at the state and national levels.

"To be selected for this award is so humbling," Eggensperger said. She noted that a film crew came to her Thompson Falls home and interviewed her. They asked her about her success. "It's not my success because it's not one person. There's a whole board involved an administrative team that sets the strategic plan. I don't look at it as my success but a recognition of the contributions trustees make to their organizations."

Along with being on the CFVH board, Eggensperger has served on the Healthcare Trustee Association of Montana and eight years on the Montana Hospital Association Board, being named the 2010 trustee of the year. She went on to serve at the national level, on the American Hospital Associations Committee on Governance and Leadership Development Committee. Gov. Steve Bullock appointed her to the Health and Wellness Key Industry Network as part of the Main Street Montana project.

"I think my passion is about quality care and patient safety and the other passion I have is about trustee education," Eggensperger said. "And trying to make boards be the best they can be so that they can help their community and help their hospital be the best that it can be."

Eggensperger said that throughout her time serving on the CFVH board, there has been a shift in focus on working upstream with preventive care and helping patients take care of themselves rather than just taking care of sick people. She said the responsibility of the board has changed throughout her tenure. "Trustees used to help fundraise and oversee the budget. The more important role for now is about quality. Ensuring that the quality in the hospital is the best that it can be and ensuring patient safety, and holding the administration accountable for that." She has been a champion for trustee education, and as the Montana representative to the Western Regional Trustee Symposium for almost a decade, she planned events that provide learning opportunities to board trustees throughout the Northwest.

Eggensperger's work at the local level isn't complete. "I want to see a continued focus on quality and patient safety, and an improved patient experience," she said when looking ahead with CFVH.

Hanson described the impact Eggensperger has had on healthcare. "She really has contributed to healthcare for Montana at local regional and national levels in a way that few other people have, and she has does it humbly. I am appreciative of her contribution to healthcare in general and frankly to helping me be the leader I've been at Clark Fork Valley Hospital," Hanson said. "She does it all without an agenda, except that she wants healthcare to be the best it can be for residents in Sanders County."

Eggensperger and her husband Tom are former owners of The Sanders County Ledger. "It's important for us to have board members who are outside of healthcare. She came from the newspaper industry and so has that critical thinking, question asking sort of approach to everything and so she brought that into the board room, which is tremendous," Hanson said.

"At a time when healthcare is a top national concern and a top personal concern for all of our neighbors, we stand tall on the shoulders of individuals who have worked tirelessly to improve our healthcare system," said Rich Rasmussen, CEO of the MHA. "We're pleased to honor the lifetime achievements of Bina Eggensperger for all of her contributions to health and healthcare in Montana."

Fellow CFVH board member Erika Swanson Lawyer said Eggensperger is probably the most deserving person for the award. "I admire her for being so focused," Lawyer said, "because not a lot of people can hold focus for that long on something that's important not just to them but for the greater good. There's a lot of people that probably won't know her name and won't know how she affected their healthcare in Sanders County, but I can guarantee you she did."

Hanson called Eggensperger a "champion for quality and said that she talked about quality at every CFVH board meeting and pushed the organization to be the best that it could be. "I think that culminated in 2017 when we were named one of the top 100 critical access hospitals," Hanson noted. "Folks may not always remember that it was Bina that helped to drive that, but that's going to be an instilled characteristic in our organization, hopefully, forever."

Eggensperger said that quality healthcare is a board's responsibility. "Right after I got on the hospital board, the hospital (CFVH) quit delivering babies for a while," she stated. "And that was a real hole in our community that we couldn't deliver babies. In Montana, we have a lot of hospitals and most of them are rural. It's just the lifeblood of the community. If you don't have good healthcare, then people aren't going to live there and your community's not going to thrive. So, it's everything."

The Eggenspergers retired in 2017 and live in Thompson Falls, where they grow grapes at their Gut Craic vineyard.

Lawyer added that Eggensperger does a really good job of filtering through information and making sure key information gets delivered to the people who need to hear it. "She's a business person. She's smart. She understands that if you want people to live here and come here and raise kids here, they've got to feel safe," Lawyer said.

MHA established the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007 to honor individuals who have made important contributions to health and/or healthcare in Montana.

Recent past recipients of MHA's Lifetime Achievement Award include Dick Brown, formerly of the Montana Hospital Association (2019); John Bartos, formerly of Marcus Daly Memorial Hospital in Hamilton (2018); and Dr. Nick Wolter, formerly of Billings Clinic (2017).