The Center for Patient Partnerships

Our History

CPP was founded in 2001 on the belief that to improve health care quality, patient-provider interaction must improve, and health care systems can either support or impede that partnership.

Martha "Meg" Gaines, a law professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, survived cancer and transformed her own self-advocacy experience into a model for consumer-centered patient advocacy. Initially, she worked with a handful of cancer patients referred to her by her oncologist. She quickly recognized the potential for this type of advocacy experience to prepare graduate and professional students to learn patient-centered practice.

Working with colleagues from medicine, nursing, and public administration, she drew on the pedagogy of clinical legal training, and the experiential emphasis of health professional and social work training, to develop a new and as yet unique educational center.

Our Logo

Our logo represents a sailboat.

We envision advocacy as the vessel and the patient as the captain of the ship. As patients, we would never dream of leaving the shore without a first-rate navigator, engineer and first mate. Often, we are at the helm and days seem to pass slowly, uneventfully. However, when diagnosed with a life-threatening illness, dangerous seas loom as we face a long and billowy journey through a confusing health care system. We then need the help of our crew to reach safety. When someone else is better skilled to steer, we gladly turn over the helm and either hit the deck to help the crew or go below to seek shelter from the storm.

No matter who is at the helm, the patient is always the captain and all decisions that affect our health care journey are ours to make. We rely profoundly on the knowledge, expertise, advice and cousel of our trusted crew in reaching those decsions. The Center for Patient Partnerships exists to provide the sailboat. It helps the captains choose destinations, indentify crews and plan routes that maximize the chance for a safe, efficient journey. As a part of this process, the Center trains navigators, engineers and first mates for the 21st century.

Timeline:

2000	Center for Patient Partnerships ("CPP") opens office
2000	Wallis Foundation provides CPP's first grant
2001	CPP approved by Law, Medicine, Nursing Schools' and University Academic Planning Council
2001	Students begin advocacy work at CPP
2001	Howard and Linda Stern pledge a million dollars to CPP
2001	Irving S. Cooper Family Foundation, David L. Klein Jr. Foundation, LLL Foundation provide seed funding
2002	Pete Daly becomes CPP client
2002	CPP's fourteen-member Academic Coordinating Committee assembles
2003	CPP Co-Founder Helene Nelson becomes Secretary of WI Dep't of Health and Family Services
2003	Center receives the UW's University & Community Partnerships Award
2004	Helen Whitman-Obert - retired oncology nurse, extraordinary colleague succumbs to cancer, generously honoring CPP in her will
2004	CPP holds the first annual "If the Shoe Fits" Auction, raising $55,000
2005	Director Meg Gaines named 2005 Woman of Distinction by YWCA
2005	CPP hires Associate Director Sarah Davis
2005	CPP staff helps secure passage of Senate Bill 288, ensuring coverage for patients who enter clinical trials
2005	CPP makes the Sunday New York Times front page (8/14/05)
2005	Director Meg Gaines on steering committee for international conference entitled "Where's the Patient's Voice in Health Profession Education?"
2005	Director invited to join Institute for Healthcare Improvement 100,000 Lives Campaign: Patient, Family, & Consumer Community Task Force
2005	Director receives Wisconsin Women's Health Foundation's Lotus Award
2005	Howard S. Stern, brilliant mentor, loyal friend, succumbs to cancer but continues philanthropy
2005	CPP begins year long project to address healthcare access issues with local Latino and Hmong communities
2006	Director receives American Cancer Society Lane Adams Quality of Life Award
2006	CPP receives Komen Foundation grant to train breast cancer survivors in patient advocacy
2006	Center spearheads first meeting of professional and lay patient advocates and educators to launch professional organization
2006	Pete Daly receives Volunteer Award from United Way of Dane County
2007	CPP receives second year of funding from Komen to expand training of breast cancer survivor advocates
2007	CPP trains human resource (HR) and employee assistance program (EAP) personnel in health advocacy, as part of a pilot program funded by the Ira and Ineva Reilly Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment
2007	CPP hires Advocacy Coordinator and launches new advocacy line to streamline intake
2007	CPP publishes Body and Spirit: Healing Your Way, a film featuring perspectives on integrating traditional Hmong beliefs and practices with "Western" medicine
2008	CPP receives third year of funding from Komen to provide Survivorship Care Planning workshops to breast cancer and other survivors
2008	CPP launches 12-credit Certificate programs in Consumer Health Advocacy for graduate, professional, working, and non-traditional students
2008	CPP receives funding from the Division of Continuing Education to explore the creation of on-line/distance patient advocacy curriculum
2009	CPP receives fourth year of funding from Komen to provide Survivorship Care Planning workshops to breast cancer survivors and to develop a free, accessible, online self-advocacy curriculum for Dane County breast cancer survivors.
2010	CPP receives fifth year of funding from Komen to continue providing a free, accessible, online self-advocacy and survivorship curriculum for Dane County breast cancer survivors, and to work in collaboration with the Wisconsin Well Women's Program to plan and develop an advocacy safety net for medically underserved breast cancer survivors in Dane County.