Board of Directors
Diana Pineda
Executive Director
Diana has a degree in Business Administration with a specialty in Gestalt Psychology.
Her passion for helping the community began when she came to live in the United States, she learned what a resilient community is. Being part of the immigrant community has made her feel and live the opportunities, but also the challenges that we all face.
Being a Health Promoter, she has the pleasure and pleasure of being able to learn more about the Latino community every day and to be able to help in whatever capacity she can.
She has been a Health Promoter for 20 years, and thanks to her experience and passion founded Vuela for Health, where every day she is grateful for the beautiful opportunity to work alongside the incredible team she has formed; a team with all the passion, creativity, integrity and dedication that works together every day to represent and bring the best to our community.
Lilia Cervantes, MD
Board Chair
Dr. Lilia Cervantes is a professor in the Department of Medicine and the Director of Immigrant Research at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. She earned her bachelor’s degree, medical degree, residency in internal medicine, and Master of Science in Clinical Science at the University of Colorado.
Dr. Cervantes is recognized for pioneering community participatory research that has resulted in transformative changes to Medicaid payment policies and healthcare regulations in Colorado, enabling uninsured immigrants with kidney failure to access essential services such as maintenance dialysis, home dialysis, outpatient COVID-19 care, and, more recently, treatment for chronic conditions. By partnering with community members, she has gained insights into the social and structural challenges faced by racial and ethnic minoritized individuals.
Dr. Cervantes also developed and evaluated community-based clinical interventions employing community health workers to tackle kidney health disparities. Dr. Cervantes is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and a member of 5 civic and community boards. Dr. Cervantes has received numerous accolades for her research and community service, including the 2024 Bernard Lown Award for Social Responsibility.
Kim Benson
Board Treasurer
Kim Benson, MBA, is a retired healthcare business executive whose 35-year career has focused on timely data collection, intelligent process design, and interdisciplinary care delivery; all with the goal of improving patient safety, clinical outcomes, and practice effectiveness.
Ms. Benson’s community volunteer commitments are in the areas of public education, youth mentorship, and non-profit health care.
Elizabeth Rumbel
Board Secretary
Elizabeth Rumbel is a Senior Workforce Development Specialist at the Denver Prevention Training Center. In this role, Elizabeth merges her workforce development expertise with her passion for systems-level change to provide training, technical assistance, and project management support to the national public health workforce.
Prior to this role, Elizabeth served as the Healthy Living Coordinator for the Denver Housing Authority’s Mariposa Neighborhood, a nationally recognized redevelopment initiative, and worked to ensure that health equity was improved within the natural and built environment, social and mental well-being, and transportation, access, and safety. Elizabeth earned a Masters in Social Change from Iliff School of Theology and a Bachelor of Business Administration from Rider University.
María Milagros Kneusel Rivera, DNP, MSHCE, MSN Ed, RN, CMGT-BC
Community Member
Dr. Maria Milagros Kneusel Rivera (She/Ella) is a Registered Nurse and a dedicated advocate for health equity and the dignified care of underrepresented populations. Maria is a System Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging at CommonSpirit Health.
She is the owner of Health Equity Nurses, PLC, a health equity consulting firm. Maria is also a Promotora clinical trainer. She chairs the Colorado Action Coalition’s Future of Nursing Strategic Advisory Committee to Advance Health Equity, and the Impact Advisory Council for the Colorado Center for Nursing Excellence.
Maria received the National Hispanic Nurse of the Year award in 2021 for her efforts to vaccinate and educate the Latino community during the Covid pandemic. In 2022 Maria received the prestigious Nightingale Luminary Award and the Sigma Theta Tau Excellence In Diversity, Inclusion and Equity Award.
Patricia Valverde, PhD MPH
Community Member
Laura Vargas, PhD, MPA, MSW
Community Member
Laura Vargas, PhD, MPA, MSW is a bi-cultural Mexican/American, multi-lingual Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado. Her research and clinical practice focus on the impacts of firearm-related violence, trauma exposure, and migration on mental health and health service utilization among Latino and Hispanic populations.
She received her PhD from the School of Social Work at Columbia University and received her MSW and MPA from the same university.
Rocio Pereira, MD
Executive Advisory Council Member
Dr. Pereira is a physician leader and health equity champion at the safety-net health care system Denver Health where she serves as Director of the Office of Community Integrated Health Care and the Division Chief for the Endocrinology clinical specialties group. She is a Professor of Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine in the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism & Diabetes.
Dr. Pereira is Co-Director of the Vuela Corazon Sano program implemented by the Vuela for Health team, which provides community-based culturally informed education services to the local Latino community. Dr. Pereira served as President of the Vuela for Health Board of Directors from 2018-2023 and has been an Executive Advisory Council Member from 2023 to the present time.