Year in Review: Stories That Shaped 2025
It’s hard to believe it, but 2025 has wrapped up. In case you missed it, here’s a round-up of HHRI’s biggest stories, milestones, and moments from 2025. From groundbreaking research to community highlights, here’s a collection of stories that have shaped our journey this year.
A stand of its own: E-STAND study improves the lives of neurotrauma patients
In the blink of an eye, 24-year-old Evan Faucett’s world turned upside down during a motocross competition when his bike landed without him. That life-changing moment was over six years ago on July 9, 2018. It’s been a long road to recovery, but with the help of the Epidural Stimulation After Neurologic Damage (E-STAND) study implant and the Restorative Neurotrauma Lab (RNL) with Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI) and Neurosurgeon, David Darrow, MD, PhD, at the helm, his quality of life has vastly improved.
While epidural spinal cord stimulation has been used for almost 50 years for chronic pain management, about ten years ago, researchers discovered that it could be used to recover some voluntary movement in paraplegic patients. Given this discovery, the E-STAND trial was born.
Restorative Neurotrauma Lab (RNL): A small lab making a big difference
The Restorative Neurotrauma Lab (RNL) describes itself as “a small lab making a big impact for those who have suffered.” The RNL is within the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI) and is studying neuromodulation to improve the lives of individuals who’ve suffered neurotrauma.
Neurotrauma is an umbrella term to describe injuries to the nervous system and includes traumatic brain injury (TBI) and spinal cord injury (SCI). There are many different types of neuroelectric devices used in medicine to target nerves in the body to decrease pain or restore bodily functions. Neuromodulation uses electrical impulses and can be used in most areas of the body, and is currently being used to treat urinary and bowel incontinence, SCIs, Parkinson’s disease, hearing loss, pelvic floor disorders, chronic pain, tremors, headaches, depression, and other health conditions.
The Quorum for Community-Driven Wellness Research: Guiding research that promotes health equity for people experiencing homelessness and living with chronic illnesses
The Health, Homelessness, & Criminal Justice (HHCJ) Lab is embedded within the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), the research arm of the Hennepin Healthcare System (HHS). The HHCJ Lab conducts research that focuses on the complex drivers of health for people experiencing homelessness and/or criminal justice involvement. Within this context, the lab studies physical health, mental health, and substance use conditions and the overlapping systemic barriers to health, often driven by structural racism.
Further within the HHCJ Lab is The Quorum for Community-Driven Wellness Research, Quorum for short. “Quorum is a community-engaged research team made up of various knowledge-holders: community partners, research staff, housing partners, and community health workers.” This framework ensures “having the right people at the table to make meaningful decisions.” It functions to bridge the gap between community and institutional knowledge surrounding wellness research for community members experiencing homelessness.
Healing Future Generations: One woman's journey in helping expectant families and parents of young children
Imagine who you are now. Now, imagine your identity completely changing. That is the stark reality for many women who choose to become mothers. For six-time Oscar nominee, Amy Adams in the 2024 book-to-film adaptation, “Nightbitch,” her newfound identity as a former artist turned stay-at-home mom has her barking at the moon-literally.
“Nightbitch” was the December 2024 selection for the MSP Film Society’s Cinema Club. MSP Film Society members gather on the second Saturday of each month at the Main Cinema in the historic Minneapolis neighborhood of Saint Anthony. Following the film, there’s a discussion on the film’s theme led by a subject expert, a film critic, or a member of the Cinema Club’s programming team.
Under Pressure: The Birth of Hyperbaric Medicine in Minnesota
The Hennepin Healthcare History Center’s exhibit, Under Pressure: The Birth of Hyperbaric Medicine in Minnesota, opened this month in the HCMC Blue Building’s lower-level lobby and tunnel. The display features early images and objects from the hospital’s first hyperbaric chamber that opened in 1964, and the second chamber, which opened in 2012.
The hyperbaric chamber is a pressurized room where patients undergo hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which involves exposing high concentrations of oxygen to your blood and tissues to treat infections, tissue injuries, poisoning, and other medical conditions.
To Antarctica & beyond; Infectious Diseases researcher Kristina Burrack, PhD, completes Homeward Bound trip
Stop. Waddle time. HHRI Principal Investigator Kristina Burrack, PhD, along with 122 participants of the year-long women in STEMM leadership program, Homeward Bound, “could not pass go or collect $200.” They trekked across the lands of the Antarctic Peninsula, pausing along the way to wait for any penguin crossings.
Biosecurity measures are vital to prevent the spread of the avian flu. The voyagers could not sit, stand, put anything on the ground, or squat for fear of falling over. They also had to keep a safe distance from the penguins, while wearing special heavy-duty rubber boots as biosecurity measures to prevent the spread of the highly pathogenic avian influenza, also known as the avian flu or bird flu.
Women Who Lead: Meet the leaders of HHRI
International Women’s Day (IWD), celebrated annually on March 8, started over 100 years ago in 1911, focusing on women’s equality, achievements, the gender pay gap, and raising awareness about discrimination.
Later, one celebratory day turned into one week when the U.S. President proclaimed the week beginning March 7, 1982, Women’s History Week. One week morphed into one month, and Women’s History Month was born in 1995, celebrating women’s achievements in American history.
Here at Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), females make up most of our leadership team. Let’s take a further look at the women in top leadership positions at HHRI.
The Heart Whisperer: How Dr. Fred Apple Transformed Cardiac Diagnostics
Peace. This one word ends all his emails. He’s a product of the peace and love movement that encapsulated the 1960s and 1970s and cherishes the iconic song “Imagine” by John Lennon. It’s a life philosophy he’s carried with him throughout the decades.
Since 1982, Fred Apple, PhD, DABCC, has served in a number of roles at the Hennepin Healthcare System (HHS) and Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), including Medical Director of the Clinical Laboratories, Clinical Chemistry, Clinical and Forensic Toxicology Laboratory, and Point of Care Testing (POCT) at HHS and as the Principal Investigator (PI) of the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA)-certified Cardiac Biomarkers Trials Laboratory (CBTL) at HHRI. He is also a Professor of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the University of Minnesota.
HHRI Adopts New Mission, Core Values
HHRI is excited to announce the adoption of a new organizational mission and set of core values.
The new HHRI Mission is:
Transforming health and healthcare for all through ethical research and meaningful community partnerships.
The new Core Values for HHRI are:
Excellence
World-class health science research and education engages, serves, and uplifts impacted communities’ experience.
Integrity
Advance ethical research through transparency, trust, and open communication.
Collaboration
Build and sustain meaningful partnerships to ensure responsive research driving real-world impact.
Redefining Tobacco Cessation and Mental Health Care: Inside BHERG’s Mission to Break the Cycle
Director of Training and Mentoring and Senior Psychologist, Sandra Japuntich, PhD, LP, and Senior Psychologist and Director of the Hennepin Healthcare Tobacco Dependence Clinic, Drew Busch, PhD, LP, both have Minnesota roots. However, they met on the other side of the country during their respective clinical internships at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. It is indeed a small world after all.
Family, career opportunities, and their shared friendship brought them back to Minnesota and to Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute, where they formed the Behavioral Health Equity Research Group (BHERG). Dr. Busch and Dr. Japuntich operate as co-directors of BHERG.
Celebrating Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute’s Research Heroes
At the Hennepin Healthcare Research Institute (HHRI), our investigators have been translating scientific knowledge into discoveries that have made a difference since 1952. In 2025, we kicked off our HHRI Research Heroes series, highlighting our extraordinary staff and scientists who are behind the amazing work that is advancing medicine and making healthcare more accessible for all.
In honor of Women’s History Month in March, we featured Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, and Medicine (STEMM). Later in the year, we highlighted nephrologists from HHRI’s Nephrology Division. Listen to our investigators and staff talk about their career focus, career inspiration, and work/life balance.