Mariana has dedicated her career to decreasing health and educational disparities among low income children. She is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine and an attending pediatrician at Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Uptown clinic where, for the past 22 years, she has cared for a diverse, multilingual, medically complex, underserved patient population. She is the current president of the Illinois Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics. She is nationally recognized for her work with Reach Out and Read (ROR), a program that partners with pediatricians to promote early literacy development and is currently serving as medical director of ROR Illinois, representing and supporting 130 ROR sites throughout the state, and training medical providers regionally on literacy promotion in pediatrics. Mariana is the author of “I Love You Like Sunshine: How Everyday Play and Bedtime Stories Grow Love Connections and Brainpower,” a book for newborns and their caregivers, with over 55,000 copies in distribution in hospitals, clinics, libraries, and community programs nationwide.