Create Change Through Lived Experience: The Whole Advocate™ Model

Dave Bjork is a patient advocate and research evangelist with more than 20 years of progressive experience in community-building, nonprofit fundraising, and patient engagement and empowerment leadership roles. He is currently Vice President of Empowerment for Gryt Health, working on a team to provide patient-centric solutions to Gryt Health’s pharmaceutical and healthcare clients’ most challenging problems in order to help them better address patient needs. Dave is also host of the Research Evangelist Podcast where he interviews people in life sciences doing meaningful work. In addition, he is an advisor to Medidata Solutions where he serves on the Patient Insights Board team to bring the patient voice to the clinical trial experience. Previously Dave spent 8 years leading nonprofit fundraising and advocacy teams, including 4 years as Vice President of Development for National Foundation for Cancer Research where he was responsible for all fundraising and advocacy efforts. 

A lung cancer survivor, Bjork has made it his life mission to connect patients, biopharma companies, academic institutions, and other key influencers to forge strong partnerships to focus on research. He also advocates for and builds bridges between patient groups and the biopharma industry. He proudly serves on the Advisory Board of the Cancer Epigenetics Institute at Fox Chase Cancer Center, and the Board of The White Ribbon Project, a grassroots 501(c)3 nonprofit raising lung cancer awareness. Dave earned a BS in Economics and Finance from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Living Proof Advocacy™ was founded by Tim Cage and John Capecci, who met more than 20 years ago in a graduate school course about the power of stories told out loud. Since then, they’ve helped thousands of advocates and hundreds of organizations share their stories to increase awareness, educate others, create change or raise funds. Tim and John are also co-authors of Living Proof: Telling Your Story to Make a Difference. 

For more than 20 years, Tim Cage has coached and consulted with celebrities, sports stars, business owners, thought leaders and everyday advocates with extraordinary passions. Tim brings a keen understanding of public relations, media, presentation skills and how high-profile spokespersons use their stories to make an impact.

Living Proof Advocacy™ was founded by Tim Cage and John Capecci, who met more than 20 years ago in a graduate school course about the power of stories told out loud. Since then, they’ve helped thousands of advocates and hundreds of organizations share their stories to increase awareness, educate others, create change or raise funds. Tim and John are also co-authors of Living Proof: Telling Your Story to Make a Difference. 

John Capecci is a coach, consultant and writer who has helped hundreds of nonprofits and corporations do award-winning work that touches hearts and turns heads. John excels at helping mission-driven organizations hone their messaging and create powerful advocates to support those messages with their stories.

Kate oversees social media and influencer engagement at Evoke KYNE, a communications agency that harnesses insight, experience and creativity to advance health and wellbeing around the world. With a passion for the opportunities social media brings, Kate strives to develop strategic social programs that tap into stakeholder insights and influencer relationships to deliver authentic and engaging content. During her 15 years of working in healthcare communications, Kate has been at the helm of award-wining social and influencer campaigns and has spoken and contributed to various industry events and publications on social media. She was named a MM+M 40 Under 40 Honoree in 2021 and for the past three years has served as a judge for the WEGO Health awards, honoring online patient advocates and leaders in digital and social communications.