Michael Kupkowski, MD
Family Medicine
Joshua Merok, MD
Family Medicine
Cristina Salazar Rodriguez
Office Manager
If you have any insurance related questions, please contact our office.
Ewar Lizzetti received his original training in Lima, Peru. After owning his own business for many years, he decided to return to his passion of laboratory medicine and phlebotomy. After doing so, he expanded his training working alongside Dr Cook, Lupe and Cris, and embraced a role in educating the next generation of physicians. His role has expanded with his new team at Windy City Health Partners. Ewar is fluent in both Spanish and English.
Christina started her career in healthcare in 2017 as a Receptionist for Dr J Wesley Cook. As she gained experience and comfort with clinical medicine, she was promoted to the role of Patient Advocate. Christina found it very rewarding to have more patient engagement in her new position. During the Covid Pandemic of 2020 and 2021, she gained further experience in the clinic by performing covid tests and administering covid vaccines. She felt the responsibility to reassure patients we were here to help them through that scary time, and we proudly never closed the office!
In 2023 Christina was promoted to Office Manager, and it has been an honor to be part of Windy City Health Partners and work alongside Dr. Kupkowski and Dr Merok.
Thank you for making us part of your health care journey!
Joshua Merok, MD, is a primary care physician at Windy City Health Partners, located in the Roscoe Village neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. He has over 15 years of experience working in family medicine and urgent care settings.
Dr. Merok earned his Bachelor of Science and a Master’s Degree in Toxicology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He went on to complete his medical degree at the University of California, San Francisco.
Dr. Merok undertook his residency in family medicine at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center. He completed additional fellowship training at Stroger Hospital and Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center.
Dr. Merok loves seeing and meeting interesting people every day. He also really enjoys the continual state of learning that medicine demands. Staying current with new research and trends is a challenge, but it’s one that he finds both rewarding and stimulating.
When Dr. Merok is not practicing medicine, he enjoys spending time with his lovely wife and children.
Michael Kupkowski, MD, is a primary care physician with over 10 years of experince. Dr K is now practicing at Windy City Health Partners, located in the Roscoe Village neighborhood of Chicago.
About Dr Kupkowski:
I was born in Joliet, Illinois. I grew up most of my life in Illinois with a brief stint in Phoenix, AZ, third through fifth grade. Among other things, Arizona made me appreciative of the outdoors and I’ve been an outdoor enthusiast ever since. I go on annual camping trips around the country and I have been an avid long-distance runner since I was 15 years old.
I attended the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign (UIUC) where I explored the depth and breadth of a large university. I particularly enjoyed a semester-turned-year abroad in Quito, Ecuador, where I studied Spanish and immersed myself in Ecuadorean culture. After returning, I was always looking for opportunities to use my Spanish, whether it was reading, writing or in conversation. I volunteered for El Centro por Los Trabajadores which was run by a priest. I helped local immigrants access local resources including an initiative where we made ID cards to help folks establish the basics many take for granted, like opening a bank account.
I also decided to work at a local addictions center to help them open a Spanish-language DUI-counseling program. As such, I stayed at UIUC for a fifth year to run this program and work as teaching assistant in the Chemistry program. I love teaching and plan to continue this at 2001 W Addison.
At the end of this, I met my now wife Tiffany, who was already moving to the San Francisco Bay area for a high school teaching position. We had an incredible time in the bay area from 2003 to 2010. I was extremely fortunate and privileged to be selected to the Joint Medical Program at Berkeley–UCSF. Among the highlights was doing a thesis in El Salvador looking at an animal gifting program aimed at improved childhood protein-calorie malnutrition. Going to Ecuador was a life-changing event in undergrad, as was medical school. The informal learning I experienced while living in the bay area nearly paralleled the formal learning in medical school.
We moved back to Chicago, IL, in 2010 so I could do my Family Medicine residency at MacNeal in Berwyn, IL. We’ve since had two kids, Odette and Kevin, who are 10- and 8-years-old respectively. I enjoy listening to people’s stories. For me, the most powerful part of the clinical encounter is the patient narrative. I am entrusted with and acting steward of these people’s stories and their lives. While the physical exam and diagnostic work up are paramount aspects of the clinical encounter, I find that the diagnosis is often found in the patient narrative above all else and it is important we give people the time and space to own their narrative.
