Welcoming Sol Flores: A Champion for Equity and Community

We are honored to welcome Sol Flores to the Michael Reese Health Trust Board of Directors.

A lifelong advocate for equity and community, Sol brings a wealth of experience in public service, nonprofit leadership, and systems-level advocacy rooted in equity and community. Her deep-rooted commitment to advancing the health and well-being of underserved communities aligns powerfully with our mission— and we are honored to have her join us in guiding our work forward. 

Join us in welcoming Sol Flores!  

Sol Flores

Sol Flores was born and raised in Chicago, to a family who arrived from Puerto Rico in the 1950’s. Sol’s extended family all dedicated their lives to public service and mission-based work –instilling in her, the values of service, family, love and justice. Sol was raised by a single mother, her father suffered from substance use and was absent from her life. She identifies as an Afro Latina cis gender woman and learned from a very early age the pain of racism and discrimination and the power of activism and community.

Through her work, Sol has formed deep and authentic relationships with many individuals leading and working in the diverse BIPOC communities across the Chicagoland region. She has built relationships with and has engaged in all levels of government, philanthropy, institutional and corporate entities in the region.

For five years, Sol served as Deputy Governor in the Illinois Governor JB Pritzker Administration overseeing the Health and Human Services portfolio – which comprises 10 major state agencies and commissions, representing $22B in budget spending and 16K employees. Sol directly managed and supported the executive leadership of these agencies while advising the Governor to ensure the administration’s vision and priorities were implemented.  

Throughout the last five years, Flores championed the expansion of equitable healthcare access and the restoration of the human services safety network, bringing an equity lens and focus on Illinois’ most vulnerable individuals. Sol led COVID-19 response efforts from testing and vaccines to one of the most successful rental assistance programs nationally to keep people housed. From the Governor’s Office she spearheaded a strategic plan with the HHS state agencies to break down silos and develop comprehensive interagency strategies and collaboration including Census 2020, the Home Illinois Plan, early childhood education expansion, healthcare expansion and managed the state’s response to the influx of migrants from the Southern border.

Sol founded and led La Casa Norte for 18 years, a community-based organization focusing on ending homelessness for youth and families. In that role, she built an organization from the ground up and managed all aspects of fundraising, stakeholder engagement, building teams, operations, strategic planning, board management and mission impact. Sol was effective in that role because she was able to convene individuals and groups and align values and goals to build power for real change in communities and in the lives of vulnerable Chicagoans. Sol has been recognized as a national Champion of Change for her work by the Obama White House along with numerous other awards and recognitions throughout her career.  

Sol has served on various nonprofit boards and public commissions providing strategic advising and public policy recommendations. In December 2023, Sol became the CEO of Knight Impact Partners.

With the addition of Sol Flores, our 17-member board is strengthened by her deep commitment to public service and decades of experience working across government, philanthropy, and community. We are excited for the insight and energy she brings to our team and the valuable contributions she will make as we continue to advance health equity. 

Stay connected for the latest updates and news. 

Exploring the Intersection of Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Domestic Violence

Decades of research into traumatic brain injuries (TBI) initially focused on athletes and veterans, examining the immediate and long-term effects of violent blows or jolts to the head, such as headaches, nausea, fatigue, mood swings, depression, seizures, migraines, and memory problems.  

However, there’s a less explored aspect of TBI – its impact on survivors of domestic violence. While studying brain injuries in the mid-1990s, Dr. Eve Valera, an associate professor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and a research scientist at Massachusetts General Hospital, began volunteering at a domestic violence shelter. She noticed that the abuse and problems many women reported were consistent with possibly experiencing concussions. Women reported many acts of violence that could cause trauma to the brain, as well as many post-concussive symptoms. Of the 99 women she interviewed, approximately 75% reported at least one traumatic brain injury (TBI) sustained from their partners, and about half reported more than one — oftentimes many more than one.  

Unfortunately, nearly 20 years later — concussion-related research within the domain of intimate partner violence continues to be scarce, signifying a largely unacknowledged and significantly under-researched public health crisis.  

The Brain Injury Association of America highlights that undetected and untreated TBI can result in enduring behavioral, emotional, and cognitive struggles, potentially causing issues like homelessness, unemployment, substance abuse, or even loss of life.  

The Pathways Program at Swedish Hospital, led by Director Mariá Balata, has been working to address this intersection since 2015. This initiative focuses on equipping healthcare professionals with the knowledge to recognize signs of abuse, including TBI symptoms, in survivors.  

Balata emphasizes the importance of understanding the impact of gender-based violence on health and empowering survivors.  

“The survivors we work with often have a hard time keeping track of appointments or commitments. What doctors would call noncompliance we now understand might actually be the brain struggling with executive function. What we used to think of as emotional trauma, we are now understanding may be a biological response.”  

While there’s no cure for TBI, our brains can heal, and brain injuries can get better, especially when they get identified early. Providing survivors with tools to comprehend their situation and its effects on their functioning is crucial. By understanding what’s happening to them, survivors can liberate themselves from the emotional burden imposed by people who cause harm.  

“If we can help people understand what is happening, it can provide an important release of an emotional burden that helps them regain a sense of self. Their sense of self is no longer defined by what the abuser did or the narrative that that person created. There’s a new narrative where they get to take back control.” 

“And while they still have to continue to struggle with what happened, they know they can take steps to live with it. So maybe it’s using a cane, maybe it’s knowing you’re going to need lists for everything, maybe it’s knowing you’re going to need alarms on your phone for reminders. That’s better than walking through the world thinking you’re stupid or incapable, as the abuser might like you to believe.” 

“My hope is that by providing this kind of support people learn to walk with their trauma in a way that doesn’t weigh them down in the way that it did before.” 

Michael Reese has been a partner of the Pathways Program since 2016 and is currently convening providers of domestic violence services and experts in head injury to consider how best to deepen our investment in this critical area. Our mission to ensure all Chicagoans can live healthy lives includes a focus on domestic violence. This priority area focuses on three key strategies to support both survivors and those who cause harm to break the cycle of violence: 

• Create a service-delivery system that ensures survivors of domestic violence-related head injury are identified, screened and treated; 
• Increase and strengthen services for People Who Cause Harm (PWCH); 
• Support select innovative models that expand existing domestic violence services.