Staff Profile: Remi Love, CCH Administrator
Remi Love has come to embrace the unknown.
A lifelong Chicagoan, her willingness to travel to new places, develop community-academic partnerships, sit on stage as a panelist in front of hundreds of peers, or welcome a new pooch into her home is all part of a journey that has included Northwestern University for the past 20-plus years.
“One of the things that has kept me at Northwestern and in Chicago — besides my family — is Lake Michigan and all of the scenic city views of the water,” says Love. “I also love the diversity of the city and traveling to new neighborhoods to explore the food from a variety of cultures.
One of the things that has kept me at Northwestern and in Chicago — besides my family — is Lake Michigan and all of the scenic city views of the water.”
As administrator for the Center for Community Health, Love’s role is to facilitate processes for the NUCATS-supported infrastructure team, consisting of the Alliance for Research in Chicagoland Communities (ARCC), Consultations and Shared Resource Panels (ShARPs), and the Northwestern Primary Care Practice-Based Research Program (NP3). Northwestern’s Center for Community Health has a presence in NUCATS, as well as the University’s Institute for Public Health and Medicine.
“At the core of CCH are our partnerships, so I am always looking for new and efficient ways to support our faculty and staff to ensure our continued commitment to bringing dynamic community perspectives to our academic research lens,” Love says.
Love previously worked for the Department of Surgery at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, most recently as a program administrator for the Surgical Outcomes & Quality Improvement Center (SOQIC). At SOQIC, she led the Illinois Surgical Quality Improvement Collaborative (ISQIC), focused on coordinating quality improvement efforts across a collaborative of hospitals throughout the state of Illinois. Love has experience performing various administrative leadership roles over two decades at Northwestern.
I still live on the south side with my dog, Jami. She is a hound mix that I adopted from PAWS in 2019 and has been part of my support system ever since.”
Her time spent in the Department of Surgery helped form her interests in healthcare, specifically in healthcare quality, and disparities in the delivery of care, including the FIRST Trial, a randomized study of resident duty hours.
“The FIRST Trial had real-time policy implications for resident duty hours and the results led to policy changes from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education for surgical residents,” Love says. “The whole process helped me to realize how powerful and impactful advocacy can be and how to use my voice to contribute to conversations that concerned me, such as health literacy, access to healthcare, food deserts, gun violence, and other public health crises.”
A Chicago native who grew up on the south side in the Hyde Park/Kenwood area, Love still lives on the south side with her dog, Jami, who she adopted from PAWS in 2019.
I traveled to a few shows in 2023 that were great. The most memorable was seeing the Isley Brothers in Detroit and meeting them in person. ”
“I am sibling number seven of eight, so I have a pretty big family,” Love says. “We are mostly still in and around the Chicago area and enjoy spending holidays together.”
Recently, Love has blended her newfound enjoyment of travel with one of her favorite pastimes: music.
“One of my favorite things to do is listen to music and I love to hear live music. I traveled to a few shows in 2023 that were great. The most memorable was seeing the Isley Brothers in Detroit and meeting them in person. I also saw one of my favorite artists, Maxwell, in Las Vegas and the Usher residency in Vegas, which was a lot of fun.”
Love earned her bachelor’s degree in business administration from Roosevelt University and her master’s degree in public policy and administration from Northwestern. She co-authored several publications and presentations on work at SOQIC and credits her 20-plus years at Northwestern with helping to establish a skillset that has put her in a position to make progress happen.
“From administering the newest vital sign tool or being struck by the effects of inequities, to witnessing them firsthand as a caregiver for my father who encountered several barriers while seeking the best care, I now appreciate that I have a different and valued perspective, and I enjoy sharing and exchanging my experiences and ideas with others.”
Written by Roger Anderson
