Donna Cooper

Operating Partner

Donna Cooper joins Varsity Healthcare Partners with over 20 years of executive healthcare operations and finance experience. She most recently served as Chief Operating Officer of Duly Health and Care (formerly known as DuPage Medical Group), the largest independent, private equity-owned medical group in the country employing over 1,000 physicians with $2 billion in revenue. While at Duly, Ms. Cooper was responsible for clinical operations including multi-specialty service lines, ASCs, a contact center and ancillary services. Ms. Cooper took on the role of Incident Commander during the COVID-19 crisis and led the group’s development and execution of the treatment, testing, safety and vaccination strategy.

Ms. Cooper served as the Chief Operating Officer of Advocate Medical Group (AMG), and President of then Advocate Dreyer Medical Clinic. AMG was comprised of over 1,200 healthcare providers, more than 5,000 associates, 350 locations, and $1 billion in revenue. In this role, Ms. Cooper was accountable for full implementation of purchase of 56 Take Care Clinics, an affiliate of Walgreens, served as Executive Sponsor of Development and Deployment of the Advocate Operating System based on the lean Toyota Production System, and was responsible for driving results in value-based care programs.

Previously Ms. Cooper served as CEO and CFO of Physicians’ Clinic of Iowa, a privately owned medical group with $50 million in revenue, 50 surgical specialists, and 250 associates. It was here that she initiated a management services organization which provided management services to community medical groups, and also opened a new state-of-the-art joint venture surgery center.

She began her career as a Certified Public Accountant at Arthur Andersen, focused on not-for-profit healthcare auditing and tax advising. Ms. Cooper holds a BBA in Accounting and a Master of Health Administration, both degrees from University of Iowa. In 2013, Chicago United honored her as a Business Leader of Color, and in 2022 Ms. Cooper was awarded the Crain’s Notable Executives of Color in Healthcare.