July 2026

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Memorial Day weekend has come and gone, and with that has come a familiar shift at Hennepin Healthcare's emergency department.

Motorcycles hit the road. People take risks they wouldn't take in February. And when things go wrong, some of those people arrive at Hennepin in a coma, their brains swollen and bleeding, with families in waiting rooms who haven't yet absorbed what is happening.

Gaylan Rockswold, MD, PhD, has seen it more times than he can count.

"When people start doing crazy things, that's when it happens," said Rockswold, a neurosurgeon and principal investigator at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI). "The summer months, Memorial Day weekend, classic. Fall can be busy too. It's seasonal, but not always predictable."

Every summer, a new group of undergraduates gets a front-row seat to see how healthcare actually works. The Rockswold Health Scholars Program brings students into Hennepin Healthcare and the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) for 10 weeks, giving them a real look at how research, education, and patient care come together.

Longtime Hennepin Healthcare neurosurgeon and researcher Gayland Rockswold, MD, PhD, and Mary Garnaas Rockswold started the program at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, to give students hands-on experience working alongside HHRI researchers, Hennepin Healthcare clinicians, and other healthcare professionals. The Rockswolds created it to support future healthcare leaders and encourage students to explore careers in medicine and research.

Awards & Honors

Congratulations to HHRI's 2026 Top Doctors

While everyone at Hennepin Healthcare and HHRI makes a difference every day, we want to give an extra shout-out to the physician-scientists featured in this year's prestigious Mpls.St.Paul Magazine "2026 Top Doctors." These physicians were selected through a peer-nominated and juried process.

Mpls.StPaul Magazine's 2026 Top Doctors

Dr. Gretchen Buchanan awarded K01 grant to study the implementation of integrated care for perinatal opioid use disorder

Opioid use disorder (OUD) in pregnant, postpartum, and parenting families is a public health crisis. This population struggles to receive adequate healthcare in specialized treatment and general healthcare settings due to societal stigma. These experiences contribute to lifelong impacts and generational trauma for the children who lose a parent due to drug overdose, child protection removal and termination of parental rights, or are raised by a parent struggling with addiction. Research has shown that there are clear ways to help these mothers and families heal and flourish, changing their life trajectories and those of their children.

Congratulations to Gretchen Buchanan, PhD, LMFT, LADC, for her recent 5-year Mentored Research Scientist Development Award (K01) of $948,093 from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), to change this narrative by studying the implementation of a whole-person approach to perinatal opioid use disorder. The study's demographic will focus on expectant mothers and those parenting children. Dr. Buchanan's work will seek to overcome healthcare system complexity to achieve sustainable, effective paradigm shifts for treatment of this patient population.

Spotlight

Featured: Hyperbaric Oxygen Brain Injury (HOBIT) Treatment Trial

HCMC is part of a national research study that will see if high-dose oxygen given under pressure can help people aged 16-65 with severe traumatic brain injury. This treatment is also known as hyperbaric oxygen treatment.

The goal of the study is to identify the best way to deliver high-dose oxygen under pressure so that severe traumatic brain injury patients can recover with less disability. 

Recognizing Excellence

Recent Presentations

• David Darrow, MD, MPH, FAANS, FCNS, recently spoke at the Minnesota Regional Spinal Cord Injury Model System Grand Rounds on Spinal Cord Stimulation for Restoration of Function after Spinal Cord Injury (SCI). During the webinar, he discussed how spinal cord stimulation can significantly improve the lives of people with spinal cord injury (even years after injury), but it's not a one-size-fits-all approach. Individualized spinal cord stimulation will likely yield the best results for future optimization.

Recent Publications

• Rachel Nygaard, PhD, and Emily Colonna, MS, published their article "Synthesis of Protocols for Frostbite Care From the FROST Study Sites" in the Journal of Burn Care & Research on July 1, 2026. The FRostbite ObServational Trial (FROST) aims to bridge the gap between the severity of frostbite injuries and how understudied its treatment is. Frostbite care protocols at 16 participating North American sites were reviewed to improve how frostbite is treated and patient outcomes.

• Gretchen Buchanan, PhD, LMFT, LADC, co-authored the article, "Mindfulness-Based Programs for Perinatal Depression, Anxiety, Stress, and Psychological Well-Being: A Systematic Meta-Review" published July 22, 2026, in the Mindfulness journal. Dr. Buchanan and fellow co-authors discuss how evidence-based methodologies like mindfulness-based programs (MBPs) are beneficial for the maternal mental distress that can sometimes occur during the perinatal and postpartum periods.

• Hana-May Eadah, PhD, LP, co-authored a new study on "Changing cannabis use among diverse adolescents over a 12-year period of policy change: Trends and disparities" published in Social Science & Medicine. The study, conducted by investigators from the University of Minnesota, University of Connecticut, and HHRI, found that despite cannabis being more accessible, overall use among teenagers has sharply decreased from 12.7 to 5% from 2013 to 2025. However, marginalized youth groups still reported past 30-day usage at a much higher rate than their peers.

In the Media

• Behnam Sabayan, MD, PhD, MSc, FAHA, published an article, "What is Brain Health?" on July 9, 2026, on the American Academy of Neurology's BrainandLife.org website. The article explores practical insights into what brain health really means and why protecting it is essential for long-term well-being.

• Infectious disease and tick researcher Diana Zychowski, MD, MPH, featured as a guest on season 6, episode 3 of the Healthy Matters podcast with Hennepin Healthcare Internal Medicine physician and podcast host, David Hilden, MD, MPH, FACP. The episode, entitled "Tick-Talk! We're Talking Tick-Borne Illnesses," discussed the basics of these bothersome bugs, the current state of ticks in Minnesota, the many illnesses they can carry, and what to do if you get bitten.

• CBS News Minnesota (WCCO); KIMT3 in Rochester, MN; and Phys.org are among the media that reported on Hana-May Eadah, PhD, LP's study on "Changing cannabis use among diverse adolescents over a 12-year period of policy change: Trends and disparities," recently published in the journal Social Science & Medicine.

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