Nonprofits & Partnership

This story from the Sacramento Bee profiles an example of how nonprofits can partner with others to provide a service both wish to provide but can only do so at the highest level, in partnership.

In this case, of a physician—Dr. Karen Hart, Hart Medical— who wants to help homeless women by providing her medical expertise to them for free, works with a nonprofit—Women’s Empowerment—whose mission is empowering homeless women, by providing the connection to the most essential service upon which any future empowerment can be built, good health.

This is a four-way-win with the client, the program, the doctor, and society all benefiting, and is truly the way helping others can be done when really done well.

An excerpt.

“Christine Wheat has endured endless hours in emergency rooms and county clinics, waiting for care for her chronic ear infections and abdominal pain. She is used to the humiliating questions and pitying looks she gets when people find out she is homeless and has no insurance.

"There have been times when I have prayed to just get through the night or cried myself to sleep because I was in pain and had nowhere to go to get help," Wheat said. "You just go without."

“Not any longer, thanks to a local physician who has opened her heart and her practice to homeless women.

“Family practitioner Karen Hart is treating graduates of Women's Empowerment, a nonprofit program that helps homeless women get back on their feet and land jobs, for free. Free consultations. Free exams. Free treatment for everything from heart ailments to breast lumps. For conditions that require specialists, Hart is assembling a group of doctors who will provide care at low or no cost.

“It's simply part of a "business plan" that allows Hart to earn a modest living while giving back to her community, she said.

"It's something I've wanted to do for a long time," said Hart. "I've found the perfect nonprofit to work with me."

“Hart, who spent a decade working in a managed care system that she argues puts too much emphasis on the bottom line and shortchanges patients, opened her east Sacramento practice about a year ago. It offers both standard and alternative medicine, including massage therapy.”