Emily is a second-year medical student at the University of Minnesota Medical School-Duluth Campus and a member of the Tolar Laboratory in the Department of Pediatrics. She joined the Czechowicz Lab at Stanford medicine working on antibody-based-conditioning regimens to make hematopoietic stem cell transplants safer for children. Emily aspires to be a pediatrician-scientists with clinical practice in precision regenerative medicine and to increase representation to allow Native physicians to thrive in academic medicine and research.

“Much like the personalized approach of traditional Navajo healing I was raised with including herbs, songs and prayers, I am hopeful to blend Indigenous and Western approaches for wellness and healing from within.”

Emily’s community health project is to better understand the Indigenous perspective on wellness and how our uniquely view of health and wholeness uniquely impacts Native American medical student success. Her goal is to re-imagine community health through examining what wellness means in the Native American medical student community.