[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 56 (Monday, May 5, 1997)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E822]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




[[Page E822]]



                CONGRATULATIONS TO SISTER PATRICIA LYNCH

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. MARGE ROUKEMA

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 1, 1997

  Mrs. ROUKEMA. Mr. Speaker, I rise to congratulate Sister Patricia 
Lynch on her retirement as president of Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck, 
NJ, and on her half-century as a member of the Sisters of St. Joseph of 
Peace. Sister Patricia's career of compassion and caring for the ill 
and injured has been one true to the teachings of the Lord. She put her 
faith into practice, comforting the sick. She is an inspiration to us 
all.
  Sister Patricia has not been your typical hospital CEO. She could be 
found in the emergency room at 2 a.m., comforting the family of an 
accident victim. She would embrace the colleagues of a heart attack 
victim. She would console cancer patients with stories of her own 
struggle with the disease.
  Born in County Kerry, Ireland, Sister Patricia worked on the family 
farm before joining the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace as a teenager 
and was sent to a convent in England during World War II. She came to 
the United States to work with orphaned children at the Barbara 
Givernaud Home in North Bergen, a facility operated by the Sisters of 
St. Joseph. She attended nursing school at Holy Name--also run by the 
Sisters of St. Joseph--became a registered nurse, and went on to earn 
her bachelor's degree in nursing from Catholic University in 
Washington. She earned a master's degree in health administration at 
St. Louis University and spent a year as a visiting fellow at the Sloan 
School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
  Sister Patricia worked in Brooklyn, NY, as a home care nurse, 
directed an adult medical day care program in Newark and was the 
administrator of St. James Hospital from 1957 to 1964.
  The former nursing student returned to Holy Name in 1964 and served 
the hospital in many different capacities, including head nurse, 
supervisor, administrator and, finally, president and CEO.
  One of the highlights of Sister Patricia's first tenure at Holy Name 
was the establishment of the Regional Dialysis Center, the largest such 
facility based at a community hospital in the State. At the time, 
Government assistance did not cover dialysis treatment and many 
patients died. True to the spirit of her Christian beliefs, Sister 
Patricia refused to charge dialysis patients who could not afford to 
pay.
  Sister Patricia left Holy Name in 1969 to become provincial leader 
and eventually international president of the Sisters of St. Joseph. In 
1986, however, she returned as president and CEO, launching a variety 
of programs supporting women and children. She established an adult 
medical day care program, a program for pregnant women on Medicaid, day 
care for mildly ill children whose parents work, birthing centers, the 
Stella C. Van Houten Women's Outpatient Center and a Korean-language 
clinic. Over the years, she oversaw $50 million in expansion, including 
the addition of a one-story rehabilitation medicine building, a five-
story addition, acquisition of state-of-the-art technology, and the 
BirthPlace--the first hospital in northern New Jersey to offer single-
room maternity care. Sister Patricia's leadership clearly was essential 
to Holy Name's success in keeping pace with public health care needs. 
Her second tenure at Holy Name has been characterized as the decade of 
progress.
  I worked closely with Sister Patricia in recent years to end 
insurance companies' new practice of paying for only a 24-hour hospital 
stay after giving birth. Sister Patricia made Holy Name available as 
the site of 1995 hearings on state legislation requiring that insurance 
companies pay for at least a 48-hour stay and was instrumental in 
seeing that measure signed into law in New Jersey. Last year, she was 
helpful in seeing the same law passed at the Federal level. She 
deserves the special thanks of women across the Nation for her 
dedicated work on this issue.
  In recognition of her work, Sister Patricia has been honored as a 
Citizen of the Year by the New Jersey Academy of Medicine. She has 
received the Girl Scouts of America Outstanding Achievement Award, was 
named a Bergen County Pioneer Woman of the 1990s, and has received the 
Anti-Defamation League's Distinguished Community Service Award. She is 
a member of the American College of Health Care Executives, the 
American Hospital Association and the New Jersey Hospital Association, 
and a former trustee of the Catholic Hospital Association.
  Sister Patricia's education and professional experience--coupled with 
her religious vows and beliefs--represent an invaluable ability to 
understand both the ideal world and the real world and narrow the gap 
between the two. I wish her continued luck and success in her work and 
the Lord's.

                          ____________________