Oregon Lions Award IHRF Co-Founder Highest Honor
Lions Eye Bank of Oregon Award IHRF Co-Founder Highest Honor
Emanuel Tanne, M.D. Named 2009 Bev Thoman Awardee
October 2, 2009—The Lions Eye Bank of Oregon has presented the Bev Thoman Award to Dr. Emanuel Tanne, IHRF’s co-founder. The Bev Thoman Award is given annually to an individual recognized for his or her outstanding devotion to the mission and development of the Eye Bank. It is the Eye Bank’s highest award.
The Lions Eye Bank of Oregon is a non-profit organization founded in 1975 by Lions who recognized the need for an eye bank to provide tissue for transplants, research and medical education in Oregon and southwest Washington. Since its inception, over 18,000 people have received the gift of sight from tissue procured and screened by the Lions Eye Bank of Oregon. Many more ocular tissues have been provided for invaluable research and surgical training.
Dr. Tanne served as the first Medical-Surgical Director of the Lions Eye Bank of Oregon from 1975 to 1986. He represented the Eye Bank at the Eye Bank Association of America as Western Regional President, Board of Directors member and member of a number of EBAA committees including eye bank standards and certification. He was a founder and medical director of the enucleators training program for Funeral Directors at Mt. Hood Community College. Regionally, he served as Director of Surgery, SW Washington Medical Center; President, Clark County Medical Society and on the clinical teaching staff as Clinical Assistant Professor at the Casey Eye Institute, OHSU and as Adjunct Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics at the Oregon Graduate Institute.
As Medical Director Emeritus, he continues in service to the Lions Eye Bank of Oregon, holding a seat on the Board of Directors.
Dr. Tanne continues to fight blindness even though he is no longer a practicing surgeon. In 2001, he and his wife, Amy, established the Intracranial Hypertension Research Foundation, which works to help people with chronic intracranial hypertension by supporting and funding medical research to find better treatments and ultimately, a cure for this life-altering illness.