Howard M. Nathan, President & CEO
Mr. Nathan is the President & CEO of Philadelphia-based Gift of Life Donor Program, one of the largest and oldest organ procurement organizations in the United States. Having coordinated more than 30,000 organs for transplantation and tens of thousands of tissue transplants since 1974, Gift of Life Donor Program has been a nationwide leader under his guidance. Mr. Nathan joined Gift of Life in 1978 as a transplant coordinator and diligently worked his way to becoming Executive Director in 1984. In 1999, his title was changed to President & CEO, and since that time, Mr. Nathan has also become the President of the Transplant Foundation, a charitable organization supporting the mission of Gift of Life Donor Program, and is Founder and Director of Gift of Life Institute (est. 2004), an international training and research center for donation and transplantation professionals.
Mr. Nathan is considered one of the nation’s leading authorities on organ and tissue donation. He served on the Board of Directors for the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) for three terms and was also on the organization’s Executive Committee. Mr. Nathan is a past president of the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations (AOPO), the Coalition on Donation (now Donate Life America), and the International Society for Organ Donation and Procurement (ISODP). Mr. Nathan currently serves on the following boards: Delaware Valley Healthcare Council (DVHC), Musculoskeletal Transplant Foundation (MTF), National Kidney Foundation (NKF), and the Pennsylvania Governor’s Organ Donation Advisory Committee. He also served on the Advisory Committee on Organ Transplantation (ACOT), North American Transplant Coordinators Organization (NATCO), James Redford Institute for Transplant Awareness, American Red Cross Blood Services (Penn Jersey Region), among others.
A visible figure in the field of transplantation, Mr. Nathan is a regular presenter at regional and national organ procurement, transplantation and other medical/health care conferences, and has published more than 300 scientific papers and abstracts. He is consulted frequently by members of the media and has appeared on national TV news and talk programs, including New Yorker magazine, the New York Times, CBS News, and CNN. He was presented with The Belzer Award for outstanding abstract at the 4th International Society for Organ Sharing Congress in 1997. Mr. Nathan received his Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Juniata College (Pennsylvania) and has done graduate work in public health at the University of Pittsburgh. He received numerous outstanding achievement awards from national organizations including: National Kidney Foundation U.S. Transplant Games Committee (1992), National Kidney Foundation of Delaware Valley (1994), Association of Organ Procurement Organization’s Outstanding Achievement Award (1996), American Liver Foundation (2002), NDRI Award for "Distinguished Service to Science” (2007), LifeNet Health’s Exemplary Service Award (2007).
