Meet our Staff
What was eventually to become the Stanford Patient Education Research Center started in 1979 with one graduate student. Now we are 9 regular employees, including that first graduate student, Kate Lorig. At any one time, we usually have anywhere from 1 to 4 graduate or undergraduate students from universities around the world doing field work with us, as well as an occasional post doctoral fellow.
Our Leader -
Kate Lorig, R.N., Dr.P.H.
Dr. Lorig's faculty profile
Dr. Lorig's curriculum vitae
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Kate Lorig is the Director of the Stanford Patient Education Research Center and Professor of Medicine in the Stanford School of Medicine. She earned her bachelors degree in nursing at Boston University, and her masters and doctorate of public health (Dr.P.H.) in health education at the University of California, Berkeley. She came to Stanford in 1979 while a graduate student at Cal to develop and research an educational program that emphasized self-help skills for people with arthritis. This program became the Arthritis Self-Help Course, which is now offered to thousands of people with arthritis in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, South Africa, Scandanavia and elsewhere, and was the prototype for the Chronic Disease Self-Management Program, the Positive Self-Management Program for HIV/AIDS, the Back Pain Self-Management Program, and others. She has authored several books and many articles about arthritis, chronic disease in general, health education and behavioral science. She travels extensively at the invitation of organizations concerned with patient care and academic research.
Our Professional Staff
Sonia Alvarez, M.A, M.P.H.
Sonia, our Training Director, is responsible for the coordination and technical assistance for our off-site and on-site trainings. She is experienced in the CDSMP and Diabetes programs both in English and Spanish. Originally from Cuba, Sonia lived many years in Puerto Rico and has been working with the Mexican population in San Jose since 1987. She has a masters degree in Social-Community Psychology from the University of Puerto Rico and a Masters in Public Health with a concentration in community health education from San Jose State University. Prior to becoming part of the staff in 2008, Sonia had collaborated with the Patient Education Research Center for several years as the director of a community-based diabetes program for Latinos in San Jose.
Maurice (Maury) Green, Ph.D.
After earning his Ph.D. in biochemistry, Maury spent 30 years as a clinical chemist and medical laboratory director at NIH, Soroka Medical Center (Israel) and Stanford Hospital. In October 2000 Maury joined our department as our Information Systems Manager, providing TLC for our computers and tending to our patient database. Now "almost retired", he continues to serve as our guru in laboratory testing while spending much of his time in digital photography, website design and travel.
Diana Laurent, M.P.H.
Diana also joined our staff in 1986 as a research assistant while she finished her M.P.H. in community health education at San Jose State University. Her "first life," as she calls it, was in rhetoric and communication at the University of California, Davis, many years before. Besides her work in health education, training and research, Diana is also our resident "computer nerd," which doesn't mean that she's a whiz at it, but simply that she likes it. Diana is the webmaster for this web site, and manages her favorite projects, the Diabetes Self-Management Online project and Building Better Caregivers Online project.
Katy Plant, M.P.H.
Katy is a health educator and "co-computer nerd". She has been a research assistant at Stanford since 1997, and joined our center in 2001. She has M.P.H. in community health education from San Jose State University. Prior to her work as a health educator, she earned her bachelors degree from the University of California, Davis, in Exercise Physiology. Katy is webmaster and moderator coordinator on several of our online projects.
Philip Ritter, Ph.D.
Phil joined us in 1993 as our first programmer/analyst. He has a bachelors degree in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley, and earned his masters degree and Ph.D. from Stanford in anthopology. Dr. Ritter is the resident "number cruncher" and data analyst for all of our research projects.
Our "Back Bone" Staff
Eileen Bradley
Eileen is the most recent addition to our staff, working as an Outcomes Assessor, although she has worked at various offices on the Stanford campus since 2000. She has been a crucial part of our nationwide evaluation of the community Chronic Disease Self Management Program. Eileen also works on licensing and data quality assurance.
Gloria Samuel
Gloria is the office administrator for our Center. Her job is to organize the rest of us, and is the first person callers talk to when they call our main telephone number. She coordinates all trainings for our programs, as well as program licensing. Kate says Gloria also keeps her "sane."
Mirna Rosas
Mirna was a leader for our Programa de Manejo Personal de la Artritis (Spanish-language Arthritis Self-Management Program) before she became a member of our staff. She came to the United States from Nicaragua in 1984. Mirna coordinates our Spanish-language classes, and also serves as our community outreach coordinator.
Our Mentor
Halsted Holman, M.D.
The Stanford Patient Education Research Center would not exist if Hal Holman hadn't brought that first graduate student, Kate Lorig, to Stanford to help him develop and test a patient education program for people with arthritis. He has been our mentor and friend ever since. Dr. Holman is a professor of medicine in rheumatology at Stanford, and a champion for patient-centered medicine and self-management.
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