2025 Physician Champion Award
The Champaign County Medical Society is pleased to announce Dr. Rafael Ruggieri and The Christie Clinic as the 2025 Physician Champion Award recipients.
Rafael Ruggieri, MD
Dr. Ruggieri was recognized at the Fall Membership Meeting for his dedication to promote CPR to the community, As a general surgeon in the Christie Clinic he diagnosis and treats diseases or injuries that require general surgery, and provides surgical management and care for cancer, with a special interest in Breast Cancer, Skin Cancer and Colon and Rectal Cancer. Dr. Ruggieri cares for the surgical needs of both children and adults. He is happily married with five children, he enjoys spending time with his family, playing games and working around the house together. He has run the Christie Clinic Illinois Marathon and Half-Marathon multiple times. He is an Eagle Scout and continues to support the Boy Scouts as a merit badge counselor. He mentors young men as they work towards achieving the rank of Eagle as well. He is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and actively participates in church-related functions regularly. The 2025 Physician Champion award is in recognition of his dedication promoting life-saving CPR awareness and training to the community.
The Christie Clinic
The Christie Clinic was championed for being the title sponsor of the Illinois Marathon since 2009 and promoting lifesaving CPR.
In partnership with Christie Clinic Illinois Race team, they held 7 hands only CPR training sessions (including one at Memorial Stadium the Friday of race weekend which saw ~200 attendees). All in, they had about 500 volunteers complete the training.
They are passionate about their involvement as it is more than the races completed on race weekend. It’s about inspiring every single person to do good, be good and spread good. It’s about impacting the lives of those around Champaign to be healthier, better and safer. That’s what they’ve been able to accomplish with the Hands Only CPR initiative, they are equipping people with the skills and confidence to save lives. The Champaign County Medical Society honors The Christie Clinic with the Dedicated Community Service Award to honor the dedication to community service, for longstanding support of the Illinois Marathon in our community, notable for offering life-saving CPR. Congratulations to all the physicians at Christie Clinic, together they are making an impact!
Dr. Andrew Bartlett, accepted the award on the behalf of the Christie Clinic at the CCMS Fall Membership Meeting.
The award was presented at the CCMS Fall Membership Meeting on Thursday, September 4th, 2025 at the I-Hotel and Conference Center.
The Physician Champion Award was created to recognize physicians who have not only demonstrated a lifetime of physician service to patients in our area, but also have consistently gone the extra mile to use their personal time, enthusiasm, expertise, and energy in volunteer outreach through organizations or other volunteer activities in the community, state, or nation. This award was specifically created to coincide with our CCMS Fall Membership Meeting traditionally held near the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorism tragedy that brought out the largest outpouring of professional and volunteer physician support our country has ever experienced.
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