December 21, 2022
The Center for Chronic Disease Research and Policy is excited to welcome John (Jack) Flores and Lauren Mitchell as members of the 2023 cohort of our Primary care Investigators Training in Chronic disease & Health disparities (PITCH) Fellowship!
Established in 2021 and funded by a five-year Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) T32 grant, the PITCH Fellowship trains the next generation of primary care clinical investigators to improve health outcomes and care delivery for patients with chronic diseases from underserved backgrounds.
The PITCH program trains fellows to conduct health services research, share their work with the public, write manuscripts and grants, and manage projects designed to transform the health care system to better serve vulnerable populations. In addition to dedicated mentorship with CDRP faculty affiliates, fellows have the opportunity to complete a Master of Science for Clinical Professionals.
Jack and Lauren will join 2021 PITCH fellows Nicole Bohr Pierce and Nathaniel Joseph Glasser and 2022 PITCH fellows Ashley Elizabeth Brown, Jennifer H. Hwang, and Dedeepya Konuthula this July.
John Flores is currently a fellow in infectious diseases at University of Chicago Medicine. He trained in med/peds at the University of Illinois and went to medical school at the University of Texas-San Antonio. He is interested in HIV, preventive care, and addiction.
My name is John Flores, but people call me Jack. I am originally from Chicago and now in my second of a four-year med/peds fellowship. During medical school and residency, I worked with two great public health epidemiologists, Dr. Barbara Taylor at the University of Texas, San Antonio and Dr. Maximo O. Brito at the University of Illinois, Chicago. They both did HIV preventive care research and public health outreach to Latinx individuals who have or are at risk for HIV. Here at the University of Chicago, I’m starting to work with Dr. John Schneider.
I’m a geography nerd. I read maps recreationally as a kid—I love looking at a globe for fun. In epidemiological studies, we look at factors like education, employment, and age. I’m interested in how where you are in the city, the country, the world impacts your health status. So I’m looking to see if we can do spatial analytics to identify where there are disenfranchised populations or populations doing really well—and from there being able to target implementation of interventions.
I’m excited to have these two years to dedicate to research with the guidance, scholarship, and research and clinical mentorship of the PITCH fellowship.
Lauren is a 3rd year internal medicine resident on the primary care track at Cornell and went to medical school at Harvard. She is interested in community health workers, diabetes, and chronic diseases.
My name is Lauren Mitchell, and I am a 3rd year internal medicine resident at Cornell in the primary care track. I am interested in the role of community health workers in chronic disease management, especially for underserved populations. I got interested in this work from my time spent working with community health workers in both India and Peru and seeing how effectively the community health workers were able to reach hard-to-reach patients. I’m excited about researching better strategies for managing chronic diseases beyond standard office visits, and hope to be able to draw on my experiences abroad.
I’m excited about working with the amazing faculty and staff in the PITCH fellowship, and am looking forward to building foundational research skills while learning from leaders in the field. I’m from Chicago but have been living on the east coast for some time now, so I am also looking forward to returning home to my favorite city!