It wasn't a typical medical question or appointment request. Instead, a patient with alcohol-related liver disease was reaching out in a moment of crisis, seeking help with his addiction to alcohol.

For Vijay Shah, M.D., the Mr. and Mrs. Ronald F. Kinney Executive Dean of Research, that message crystallized everything wrong with current approaches to healthcare and everything that needed to change.

“That patient reached out for support when and where he needed it most, but our current technologies couldn't provide that support,” says Dr. Shah, who is also recognized as the Carol M. Gatton Professor of Digestive Diseases Research, Honoring Peter Carryer, M.D. 

In that moment, the patient didn’t need a prescription or a blood panel. They needed a medical team who saw them as more than a name and a set of numbers on a chart. They needed care that was designed just for them and their specific struggles and needs, including the challenge of managing alcohol cravings.

The experience led Dr. Shah to reflect on the current state of medical care, and particularly the way it prevents patients from receiving the care they need.

“That patient message drove me to ask key questions: How do we serve patients better?” he says. “Imagine if that patient had a wearable device that sent an alert to his care team when he had a craving, so someone could reach out proactively and ensure that he had the support that he needed right in that moment. How do we create those sorts of technologies, to help people before they reach a crisis point?”

To answer these questions, Dr. Shah and his team have created a vision for research at Mayo Clinic that will drive the transformation of medicine from a reactive, one-size-fits-all pipeline to a platform where healthcare is a proactive, personalized journey throughout life.

The Challenge in Healthcare Today

While medical institutions like Mayo Clinic excel at providing expert care, the broader healthcare system still operates largely in reactive mode. Patients develop symptoms, seek care and receive treatments based on population-level guidelines rather than their individual biology and circumstances.

Even when care is accessible in a timely manner, the fundamental approach remains the same: respond to disease after it manifests rather than prevent it from occurring. This model, while effective for many conditions, falls short for patients facing serious or complex diseases that might be intercepted or prevented entirely with the right tools and insights.

The solution required rethinking everything. As leader of Mayo Clinic's research enterprise, Dr. Shah developed a vision that transforms healthcare from reactive treatment to predictive prevention, aligning the institution’s discovery and translational science efforts with Mayo Clinic’s Bold. Forward. transformation of healthcare to accelerate access to new treatments and cures for patients everywhere.

“At Mayo Clinic, our research and practice are intertwined,” he says. “Everything we do must serve our primary value of putting the needs of the patient first, so that's where we focused our vision for research. We are addressing the fundamental challenge that our current system doesn’t have the cures our patients need for most serious or complex diseases.”

His perspectives have been shaped by his career working on liver disease.

“I’ve been interested in liver disease my whole life,” Dr. Shah says. “The liver is an organ of serious and complex diseases — such as cirrhosis. It’s a very complicated organ, and ripe with data, which is critical to our approach. Alcoholic liver disease holds such power over people’s lives, and our current medical technologies and approaches are not what patients need.”

Open image in lightbox

Open image in lightbox

Heidi Dieter, chair of Research Administration, works alongside Dr. Shah, serving as his administrative partner and overseeing many of the primary business functions of the Research shield.

“What excites me most about this vision is how it fundamentally changes our relationship with patients," says Heidi. "We're not just treating disease anymore. We're partnering with people throughout their entire life journey, using data and technology to help them remain healthy and prevent illness before it starts.”

And with 25 years of experience as a clinician and researcher, Dr. Shah brings a wealth of expertise using leading-edge digital tools, including artificial intelligence (AI), to bridge discovery science to clinical trials and beyond.

The most dramatic example of this patient-first transformation is already taking shape in how Mayo Clinic conducts clinical trials.

Revolutionizing Clinical Trials

One of the most transformative aspects of this vision involves completely reimagining clinical trials. Traditional trials face a fundamental ethical dilemma: half of participants receive an inactive treatment known as a placebo. This provides a baseline against which the effectiveness of the actual treatment is measured.

“No one participating in a trial wants to be in the placebo group, but we need to collect this data to have the most rigorous study design and truly understand treatment efficacy,” says Dr. Shah. “But what if we could change that?”

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Through AI tools and the power of Mayo Clinic Platform, a vast repository containing millions of patient records from Mayo Clinic and beyond, clinical trial teams can now conduct analyses on data from other patients with the same condition to determine the natural course of the disease without any treatment. These AI-powered control groups are called synthetic placebo arms.

“With AI and our data intelligence, we're starting to reach the point where we can collect real-world data, make synthetic placebo arms, and thereby allow our clinical trials to focus on the active intervention for all of the human patients,” says Dr. Shah. “We're not fully there yet, but we're well on our way.”

This tactic will also include the use of “digital twins” — AI-powered replicas built from individual patient data that can simulate hundreds of different treatments to determine which options might work best for any given patient. This means that clinicians will be able to match patients to the trials that are most likely to succeed for them, while simultaneously identifying which patients will benefit the most from a new treatment or trial.

As these technologies expand, there will also be opportunities to improve access to treatments by developing scalable approaches for decentralized clinical trials, bringing these opportunities into patients' own homes and communities. In short, patients anywhere around the world will be able to access Mayo Clinic-level care, where and when they need it.

“These clinical trials of the future are more patient-centric, they go faster, and they're less expensive,” Dr. Shah says. “With these advances, I believe we can reduce the time it takes to go from discovery to clinical treatment by tenfold — from 17 years down to 17 months.”

This acceleration sits within a broader framework built on three interconnected strategies that work together to deliver cures faster.  

Through the seamless integration of pioneering science discoveries, AI-powered data intelligence, and revolutionary clinical impact approaches, Mayo Clinic is creating a self-reinforcing cycle that not only accelerates the path from laboratory bench to patient bedside but also fundamentally transforms healthcare from a reactive system into a globally accessible platform for preventing and curing serious or complex diseases.

Driving Toward Cures

While these approaches represent the long-term vision for 2045, the foundation is being built today.

The Research shield has already launched two key initiatives — Precure and Genesis. Precure is aimed at intervening before patients get sick, connecting patients to critical insights that can intercept serious diseases before they manifest. Genesis’ goal is cures — using cell therapy technologies and AI-driven solutions to predict organ failure, restore organ function and eliminate the need for transplant.

As part of this effort, research teams are advancing bioengineering and manufacturing efforts, in partnership with industry experts, to design and test new therapies. Scientists are also working on advancing biosensing technology, and new trials are being launched for early detection and treatment across organ systems.

Through it all, the team is building the infrastructure and relationships necessary to make this vision a reality with strategic funding and industry partnerships to turn promising developments into new treatments and cures.

“If a researcher wants to explore a disease under Genesis, we have all the infrastructure set,” says Dr. Shah. “If a company wants to work with us to explore a new biomanufacturing approach to developing cell therapies, we can do that. It’s a scalable process.”

For Dr. Shah and his team, this isn't just about advancing medicine. It's about fundamentally changing what's possible for every patient who walks through Mayo Clinic's doors.

Detecting Cancer Risk Decades Earlier

The work of hematologist Mrinal Patnaik, M.B.B.S., with clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential (CHIP) exemplifies Mayo Clinic's Precure initiative in action, shifting from reactive treatment to proactive prevention.

As we age, the DNA in our blood cells mutates due to environmental exposures like radiation, chemicals and stress. While most damaged cells are eliminated, some survive and multiply. When numbers of these mutated clones grow large enough to detect, they're classified as CHIP. This precancer stage causes inflammation and over time, significantly increases risk of blood cancers and the risk of dying from all causes, especially cardiovascular disease.

Using advanced DNA sequencing, Dr. Patnaik's team in the Center for Individualized Medicine and Division of Hematology detects CHIP mutations from a simple blood draw. AI-driven software analyzes the data and translates it into actionable insights.

“We're creating tools that can identify precancer decades before it would traditionally be diagnosed,” says Dr. Patnaik. “This gives us a crucial window to intervene.”

Since 2016, Mayo Clinic has monitored over 1,000 patients with CHIP. Under Precure, the goal is accelerating the work and scaling to 100,000 patients. His research examines why people develop CHIP, including hereditary and environmental factors, and understanding which interception strategies have the greatest impact.

CHIP research demonstrates Precure's approach: early detection followed by interception. For patients, this means knowing cancer risk decades in advance and having concrete steps to reduce it, representing a fundamental shift from treating disease to preventing it entirely.

A Legacy Worth Building

These efforts represent more than just a vision for research at Mayo Clinic. They’re part of the Bold. Forward. blueprint for a research-driven, transformed global healthcare system.

“When I think about the legacy we're building, I imagine a world where no patient has to endure what that patient with alcohol liver disease wrote to me about in his portal message, struggling alone when he needed help the most,” says Dr. Shah. “We're creating a future where serious or complex diseases don't define the end of someone's story but become preventable chapters we can rewrite.”

By 2045, Mayo Clinic envisions a new approach to medical care where serious or complex diseases are identified and intercepted before they manifest, and where interventions are tailored to each patient’s unique profile and needs.

“This research vision isn't just about Mayo Clinic becoming the global authority in healthcare innovation,” says Dr. Shah. “It's about ensuring that every person, everywhere, has access to the tools and insights they need to thrive. That's a legacy worth dedicating our lives to building.”

The post N of 1 appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

In Minnesota, Bold. Forward. Unbound. in Rochester represents a $5 billion investment over six years. It embodies Mayo Clinic's most significant and forward-looking vision for the future of healthcare by integrating our physical and digital infrastructure and blending inpatient and outpatient care. By 2030, Mayo Clinic will transform the Rochester campus and establish a new model for continuous, digitally integrated, patient-centered care.

Craig Daniels, M.D., critical care physician and medical director for Bold. Forward. Unbound. in Rochester, sat down with Mayo Clinic Magazine’s editorial team to provide an inside look at what fuels Mayo Clinic’s vision and motivates him to help lead this transformation. This interview has been edited for clarity.

How will these spaces be radically different from today’s healthcare environment?

We recognize that patients today experience outpatient, inpatient and virtual care — all delivered in different environments — which can feel quite bumpy. With Bold. Forward. Unbound. in Rochester, we are striving to create an environment where care is seamless for patients.

As we began designing the future of care as a single, integrated experience, we realized that traditional outpatient, inpatient and digital spaces would not work. Our spaces must be flexible to meet patients’ needs wherever they are in their Mayo Clinic healthcare journey.

That means designing buildings that do more than house care — they actively support and enhance it. For example, we are creating care "neighborhoods" where diagnostics, imaging, consultations and procedures occur in one continuous environment, reducing the need for patients to move from place to place.

We're also incorporating healing design principles in every element — spaces filled with natural light, expansive winter gardens, and areas of rest and reflection for both patients and their loved ones. We're integrating technology not as a layer on top, but as an embedded member of the care team: ambient intelligence, robotics, predictive analytics and automation will allow our teams to focus more on the human aspects of caregiving.

At Mayo Clinic, we’ve always understood that the physical environment can shape medical outcomes. Just as Dr. Henry Plummer’s vision for the Plummer Building transformed medicine a century ago, this next generation of care environments will transform how we deliver hope and healing — not just for today, but for the next hundred years.

To fully live our primary value — the needs of the patient come first — we must design our spaces with patients at the center.

— Craig Daniels, M.D.

Why is now the right time for this investment?

Healthcare is at the precipice of transformation. As stewards of Mayo Clinic — the world’s leader in healthcare — we must lead this transformation and make Mayo Clinic and all healthcare better for patients and staff.

We have the tools, the technology and an incredibly talented staff who dedicate their lives to improving patient outcomes and experiences. This allows us to solve increasingly complex problems and deliver more cures. Combined with physical spaces in a new healthcare design centering on patients’ needs, we will elevate our collaborative care model to provide even more hope and healing in the world.

This is the moment when digital technology, artificial intelligence, robotics and human-centered design are converging — and Mayo Clinic is uniquely positioned to bring them together to transform how care is delivered.

Bold. Forward. Unbound. is not just an investment in buildings — it’s an investment in people, in tools that reduce burdens on staff, and in care environments that foster teamwork, innovation and healing. These spaces are designed to be flexible and intelligent, evolving with patient needs and medical advancements over the next century.

We cannot stand still. We have clarity of purpose, a shared vision and the momentum to act. Now is the time.

Tell us more about the “neighborhoods.” What is innovative about this concept?

To fully live our primary value — the needs of the patient come first — we must design our spaces with patients at the center. This means centralizing care teams and services around patients' unique needs. Neighborhoods at Mayo Clinic are innovative care environments designed to transform how healthcare is delivered and to elevate the experience of both patients and staff.

Historically, healthcare buildings have been built around departments and specific services. Think about the fact that almost all radiology equipment is located on the bottom floor of a hospital. This means that patients often need to travel significant distances between appointments for their imaging. This is also largely true for laboratory and specialty care.

By creating care neighborhoods, we'll reduce the distance patients need to travel for appointments and more closely situate things they most often will need. We believe they will experience better care, better outcomes and greater comfort throughout their entire time at Mayo Clinic.

These neighborhoods allow our teams to work side by side, surrounded by familiar spaces and supported by curated digital tools — breaking down the boundaries that have historically separated departments and stages of care. This will foster greater team-based collaboration, continuous innovation, and integration of clinical practice, research and education.

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What motivates you most about this work?

The Mayo-Franciscan “RICH TIES” values — Respect, Integrity, Compassion, Healing, Teamwork, Innovation, Excellence and Stewardship — perfectly align with our primary value of putting patients’ needs first. I am driven to live out our values through the transformational work of Bold. Forward. Unbound.

Even at an incredible place like Mayo Clinic, opportunities like this don’t come along very often, and so I am excited for my colleagues and me to directly contribute to building and experiencing these new spaces that will provide even better care to our patients and care teams.

It’s a generational moment to reimagine how we deliver care, to remove barriers for our staff, and to shape a future where patients receive more seamless, compassionate and innovative care than ever before. We’re building something that will carry forward the mission of Mayo Clinic — not just for today’s patients, but for those we haven’t met yet, and for future staff members who will carry this work forward long after we’re gone. That sense of responsibility — of stewardship — is what drives me.

The post Building Tomorrow’s Healthcare With Craig Daniels, M.D. appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

Dr. Ali sat down with Mayo Clinic Magazine to share the personal experience that inspired her work, key insights from her research, and her vision for using technology to protect the aging population. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

What initially sparked your interest in this area of research?

My interest in fall mechanisms and prediction in aging individuals dates to a personal event. My mom, who is otherwise healthy, had a fall in her 60s. The fall resulted in fractures, which affected her confidence in balancing and many daily activities. I saw firsthand that one fall can be life-changing. This situation really motivated me as it hit close to home.

As a movement disorders provider, I am passionate about gait and balance because it affects every single human being as we get older and all my patients who suffer from neurological disorders. Over the age of 65, 1 in 4 people experience a fall annually. While gait and balance changes may be thought of as part of aging, they can be an early indicator of neurodegenerative disease and give us an opportunity to intervene and prevent falls before they occur.

My research is trying to answer some important questions: Can we predict falls before they happen? Can we predict what causes them? How can we prevent them?

— Farwa Ali, M.B.B.S.

Currently, our ability to predict falls before they occur is limited, and there are few treatments for gait and balance disorders. As a result, falls have a very significant healthcare impact. My research is trying to answer some important questions such as: Can we predict falls before they happen? Can we predict what causes them? How can we prevent them?

What are some key findings that have emerged from your research so far?

I have been able to partner with the Mayo Clinic Study of Aging to analyze several thousand gait samples, and we are working to gain a better understanding of how a patient’s clinical history and gait performance predict future falls.

We were pleased to publish some of these initial results in Nature Communications in early 2025. We found that individuals with worse gait performance had higher levels of Alzheimer's disease biomarkers, indicating that changes in gait can be an early sign of brain pathology, even before cognitive symptoms appear.

How does your research integrate AI?

We’re actively working to use AI and data science to predict incident falls in the aging population. In partnership with the Mayo Clinic Study of Aging, we are using large datasets to discover clues in a patient’s gait phenotype that can predict future risk of a fall before it actually occurs. We are also evaluating how this relates to early neurodegenerative diseases.

Why is your research important?

Falls are very common among older adults. The healthcare economic burden and individual and societal impact of falls are high and are projected to increase as the aging population grows. Older adults also have a higher burden of neurological diseases, such as stroke and Parkinson’s, that can cause disability due to both cognitive and motor issues. Identifying individuals at risk of falls from aging and neurodegeneration can allow early diagnosis and implementation of preventive strategies. Our goal is to develop a tool to predict falls before they happen so we can identify people who are at highest risk and institute appropriate preventive measures.

With generous support from benefactors, I have been able to advance my research by supporting a multidisciplinary team and work toward the aims of the project. I'm incredibly grateful for their investment in science and the betterment of humanity.

Dr. Ali is a recipient of the Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Early-Career Development Award in Translational Research. The Chen Institute’s generous support accelerates projects that leverage AI and translate it into applications for patient care.

The post Predicting Falls With Precision appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

Biology in Three Dimensions

After doing his medical training in his native country of Hungary, Dr. Ordog studied neuroendocrine biology, touching on topics like electrical signals in the hypothalamus regulating the menstrual cycle. He started as a junior faculty member at the University of Nevada, Reno, before coming to Mayo Clinic in 2006. In 2012, he helped found the Epigenomics Program at the Mayo Clinic Center for Individualized Medicine. In 2020, he moved to work with the Center for Cell Signaling in Gastroenterology.

Now he and Jeong-Heon Lee, Ph.D., are hard at work creating a first-of-its-kind research enterprise: a core dedicated entirely to spatial biology.

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“‘Spatial’ is a little bit of a misleading term,” says Dr. Ordog, “because currently almost everything we do is in two dimensions [like flat X-rays of body parts], but there is no theoretical limit to why anything we discover doesn’t apply in 3D.”

Spatial biology is essentially what it sounds like: the study of tissues, cells and genes put into terms of how they relate to each other in three dimensions. Think of an organ or a tumor as a complex city, where each cell is a building with its own role and relationships to its neighbors. Some cells might be driving a disease, while others are trying to fight it off. Traditional methods could tell us what types of buildings existed in the city, but not how they are arranged or how they influence each other. Spatial biology changes that by creating a detailed 3D map of every cell in a tissue sample, showing not just what genes each cell is expressing, but how those cells work together — or against each other — in the complex ecosystem of a complete tissue.

The Perfect Partnership

Drs. Ordog and Lee make a top-notch team. Dr. Ordog brought Dr. Lee, then a postdoctoral researcher at Indiana University, to Mayo Clinic to tune the technology he developed there toward human health applications. Dr. Lee’s primary focus now is an area called spatial transcriptomics, studying how gene expression in one cell affects gene expression in its neighbors.

“The ultimate goal is to build a 3D model of any tissue we study, providing information about how the cells are positioned relative to each other and how they behave — as in what genes and molecules they express,” says Dr. Ordog.

Molecules and genes are just the beginning. To Drs. Lee and Ordog, spatial biology isn’t just about the relationship between cells in one modality, but in all the ways they can relate to one another — their genes, their proteins, the ways they contact one another, cells dividing in one region and dying in another. Dr. Ordog calls this “spatial multiomics,” combining different techniques in the same space.

“We want these to be more than the sum of their modalities,” says Dr. Ordog. “The goal is to bring all these elements — the study of genes, molecules, proteins, etc. — into all relevant tissues.”

The Power of Spatial Multiomics

Bringing together all these different scientific threads will help Mayo Clinic do something completely unprecedented: create a whole new kind of pathology.

“Spatial biology shortens the translational pipeline,” says Dr. Ordog. Rather than needing to start with preclinical models, doctors and researchers can now start primary discovery with a tissue biopsy or surgical materials directly from a patient. They are looking for the needle in the haystack that might lead to a new discovery or therapy. 

The bottom line is that we want to increase the amount of information gathered from the precious biopsy material taken from our patients.

— Tamas Ordog, M.D.

“That’s what modern biology has enabled. You can pick out your molecule of interest based on whatever you’re studying,” says Dr. Lee. “You can study diseased versus not-diseased tissues. Say you discover molecules in diseased state that aren’t in healthy tissues, that’s your target.” Then scientists can go back to the lab and examine what they’ve discovered in other models to look for treatment options, armed with the knowledge that what they have found is directly involved in a patient’s health.

From Lab to Clinic

Dr. Ordog envisions a “virtual patient vignette”: A patient comes in with a form of cancer that comes in multiple forms, each with different prognoses, signs of progression and immune cell profiles, and each responds to different therapies. In the past this would be a dizzying knot to untie, but with spatial multiomics, it becomes clearer. A biopsy taken from the patient is serially chopped into sections, each of which gets processed a different way. Then the data is put back together into a three-dimensional image.

Instead of trying different therapies to see what works, clinicians could use this approach to examine the tumor's cellular architecture and predict which treatment would be most effective, saving precious time in the fight against cancer.

“The bottom line is that we want to increase the amount of information gathered from the precious biopsy material taken from our patients,” says Dr. Ordog. “Spatial biology can increase the understanding that comes out of the tissue exponentially.” That, in turn, can allow for in-depth machine learning and artificial intelligence analysis of patient data, which Dr. Ordog hopes to test sometime in the future.

All in all, Dr. Ordog, Dr. Lee and the entire team are hopeful their work will simplify the detective work that doctors and patients often experience when hunting for a diagnosis or treatment. Looking over a slide deck he uses to explain the technology, Dr. Ordog sounds a hopeful note.

“We can find the needle in the haystack without having to grind all the hay up.”

The post Reconstructing a Tumor Cell by Cell appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

Now, thanks to an innovative technology known as spatial transcriptomics, Mayo Clinic experts are able to examine how genes are expressed in a tissue sample in three dimensions, providing unprecedented insights into cellular relationships and tissue structure.

Understanding ‘Omics’

“Omics” is a term used to describe the collective study of biological molecules, from genes to proteins and beyond. Transcriptomics specifically refers to the study of gene expression — how our genetic code, or DNA, gets transcribed into RNA, which is then used to build proteins.

Understanding gene expression can help scientists better understand human biology by providing insights into where and when genes are turned on and off during development and disease. This is important for knowing how different cells function and how they interact with one another in the healthy body, as well as what changes when someone gets sick. Transcriptomics can be especially helpful for identifying biomarkers of disease, which can aid in diagnosis and treatment.

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Traditionally, transcriptomics is focused on understanding the overall gene expression within a tissue — for example, a researcher might examine the gene expression of healthy pancreatic tissue and compare it to the gene expression in a pancreatic cancer tumor, or even how a single cancer cell compares to a single healthy one. But these approaches do not preserve organizational information about how genes are expressed in different areas of a tissue or a tumor, or whether there might be variations in that expression across a sample.

A New View Through Spatial Transcriptomics

Spatial transcriptomics is radically advancing our understanding of biology thanks to the fact that with this technology researchers can see not just what genes are being expressed, but exactly where a gene is active within a tissue. This means that scientists can examine the gene expression within individual cells while preserving the broader context of how those cells are interacting with their neighbors.

This feat is accomplished through tissue preservation and microscopy techniques that maintain the tissue’s structure while measuring the expression of many different genes across the sample. This produces a detailed map of how different cells are behaving and communicating within, for example, a biopsy from a cancerous tumor.

In cancer, this is particularly impactful because it means that researchers and pathologists can now see exactly where certain genes are active within a tumor, allowing for a clearer picture of the molecular dynamics of the disease and opening new avenues for treatment.

Pioneering the Future

Mayo Clinic’s investment in spatial biology is another step toward truly personalized medicine. Led by Tamas Ordog, M.D., and Jeong-Heon Lee, Ph.D., a team of Mayo Clinic scientists are building a first-of-its-kind research core dedicated entirely to spatial biology, beginning with spatial transcriptomics. Supported by machine learning and artificial intelligence tools that analyze the 3D data generated from patient samples, they say this tool will reimagine how diseases are classified and treated.

This technology is already transforming how Mayo Clinic approaches complex cancers, as researchers work to create new ways to examine biopsy samples to predict which therapies will be most effective based on a tumor's unique cellular architecture and molecular signatures.

As the spatial biology technique develops, the team plans to build detailed tissue atlases to map the progression of various diseases in unprecedented detail, potentially revealing early intervention points and novel therapeutic targets that would otherwise remain hidden in the complex biology of human disease.

The post What Is Spatial Transcriptomics? appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

The Lifesaving Power of Paired Liver Donation

At any given time, there are approximately 10,000 people in the U.S. who are on the waiting list for a liver transplant. For patients who have end-stage liver failure, their only treatment option is usually transplantation. Approximately 20% of people on the list will die waiting for a transplant.

Transplants from living donors are an option, thanks to the liver’s unique ability to regenerate itself within a month, but just 6% of liver transplants occur this way. Following Mayo Clinic’s first-ever paired living liver donation, the surgeons are hopeful that more patients can be saved in the future.

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Paired living donations most often occur because a potential liver donor wants to give to a family member or friend but is not the best match. In that case, a paired donation is considered, with the would-be donor giving to another patient while a second donor gives to the family member or friend in need.

Mayo’s first paired living liver donation was conducted in Rochester, with a team led by Timucin Taner, M.D., Ph.D., division chair of Transplant Surgery.

“Sadly, there are not enough donated livers available for everyone who needs one,” Dr. Taner says. “That is why living liver donation is so important.”

Paired living donations are commonly used for kidney transplants but are rare for liver transplants. Only a handful of transplant centers in the U.S. offer paired liver donations because of the logistical challenges. The procedure requires a large healthcare team of nurse coordinators, physicians, social workers and others who can match patients — as well as surgical teams to carefully coordinate.

The post The Lifesaving Power of Paired Liver Donation appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

Through her groundbreaking Fostering African-American Improvement in Total Health (FAITH!) program at Mayo Clinic, she partners with Black churches to combat cardiovascular health disparities. She has focused her clinical practice and research on making preventive care more accessible and effective for all patients. She sat down with Mayo Clinic Magazine to share her connection to her work.

Growing up, you witnessed firsthand how cardiovascular disease affected your church community. Can you take us back to a specific moment or experience that first sparked your interest in becoming a cardiologist?

The African American church was the foundation of my upbringing in Charlotte, North Carolina. I saw so many people passing away from preventable diseases like heart disease and stroke. It was devastating to see these people who had helped to raise me pass away so early.

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One of the key moments that I remember was when our pastor passed away as a result of diseases that could have been prevented if he’d had the right care and resources. He was the shepherd of the flock, and there was an immediate change in the atmosphere within the church without its leader. I have carried that moment with me. I still honor our pastor, and I hope that I’m honoring him by giving back and making sure we combat the health disparities that affect the community.

You’ve pioneered innovative approaches to community health. What inspired you to create the FAITH! program, and how has it transformed cardiovascular care in underserved communities?

During my public health studies at Johns Hopkins University, I took a course that charged us with coming up with a way to influence health disparities and to promote health within the surrounding Baltimore, Maryland, community. It was a group project, and we jointly created the FAITH! program. We said, “What’s the institution that has been here for centuries that has had the most influence on this population?” and it was the Black church. And we said, “Why don’t we come up with a program that partners with a Black church that can then promote heart health?”

We can seize this moment to have an impact on communities that have been historically overlooked.

— LaPRINCESS BREWER, M.D., M.P.H.

That’s how FAITH! was born. We approached a church that was a stone’s throw away from Johns Hopkins to see if they would be interested in partnering with us. I was able to expand FAITH! to Minnesota when I started my cardiology fellowship at Mayo Clinic, and it has continued to flourish.

Could you tell us about your vision for the future of preventive cardiology? How might your current work addressing health disparities help shape that future?

I’m truly amazed at the advances we’ve had throughout my career in managing chronic diseases and cardiovascular disease risk factors. I am really looking forward to further innovations through technology, including mobile health, wearables and artificial intelligence that can address many of those risk factors early on to prevent people from getting heart disease in the first place. I also am looking forward to preventive cardiology focusing more on the social and behavioral aspects of medicine and public health, particularly the social and structural determinants of health.

We can seize this moment to have an impact on communities that have been historically overlooked. We need to take a holistic approach — looking at patients’ environments and how those environments influence what we are recommending, and if they even have the capacity to engage in many of our recommendations. We need to help address those environmental factors that may promote or hinder them from achieving the best health outcomes.

The post Caring in Community: LaPrincess Brewer, M.D., M.P.H. appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.

With a few clicks, he places a digital implant onto the model. With another click, the software runs an artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm that pulls data from the patient’s medical scans and combines it with information about the standard shoulder replacement hardware to generate new specifications for a patient-matched implant. In 4 to 6 weeks’ time, a vendor will deliver a custom 3D-printed device designed to integrate seamlessly with the patient’s body. The goal, Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo says, is to make sure it’s perfect.

In the operating room, Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo dons a high-tech headset. During surgery, the headset projects holograms of the 3D patient model and the custom implant. With a flick of his fingers, he can adjust the image to present new views. The hologram highlights the precise anatomical landmarks detailing where Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo will position and secure the implant.

“It’s like having Superman vision,” he says. “You can see through the body’s structures and see exactly what you’ll need to do during the surgery. This level of detail allows me to complete the surgery faster than ever, and I can place the implant within millimeters and degrees of complete accuracy.”

Technologies like these — augmented, virtual and mixed realities — are revolutionizing medicine across every field from surgery to medical education. As Mayo Clinic works to transform healthcare, scenes that seem like science fiction are already unfolding at all three campuses.

Joaquin Sanchez-Sotelo, M.D., Ph.D., and Giselle Coelho, M.D., Ph.D.

Transforming Pediatric Care

Giselle Coelho, M.D., Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic STR-X (simulation, telemedicine, robotics and experimental education) fellow and pediatric neurosurgeon, has leveraged this technology to address serious brain and skull malformations in infants and young children. In these cases, precision is paramount.

“Pediatric neurosurgery presents unique challenges,” explains Dr. Coelho. “These cases are relatively uncommon, and you may be faced with severe anatomical malformations. You never want the first time you do a procedure to be on an actual child.”

This is where extended reality tools become invaluable. Dr. Coelho’s team combines advanced imaging and 3D modeling technology to transform patient scans into detailed anatomical models.

These aren’t simple visual representations — they’re sophisticated surgical planning tools that clarify important details like the exact location of arteries, the precise dimensions of skull defects, and the spatial relationships between tumors and critical brain structures.

“We can simulate the full surgery before we ever enter the operating room,” Dr. Coelho explains. “The technology allows us to practice our approach, measure exactly how much bone we’ll need for reconstruction, and coordinate with other specialists like plastic surgeons.”

Even more importantly, she says that using augmented reality (AR) headsets projecting holographic images onto the physical model, they can conduct full simulations of the surgery, including nurses and operating room technicians, to ensure that every person knows exactly what to expect before the patient even enters the room.

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The impact of this approach is clear. Dr. Coelho shares an example of a complicated procedure her team conducted on a child from the Amazon region of Brazil with an encephalocele — a rare birth defect causing brain tissue to protrude through an opening in the skull. The team used AR technology to plan and demonstrate the surgical approach to the team and used a patient-specific hybrid model to plan and practice the surgery in advance.

“Traditional surgical planning might show us the general anatomy, but with these tools, we could determine the exact measurements of the defect and precisely calculate how much bone we needed to close it,” says Dr. Coelho.

For children requiring complex neurosurgery, this reduction in operating time isn’t just about efficiency. It means less time under anesthesia and potentially better outcomes. Experts say that this technology can transform not just the surgical experience, but the entire trajectory of a young patient’s life.

In the case of her patient with encephalocele, Dr. Coelho says that the procedure completely changed the child’s life, allowing her to excel in her studies and finally be able to fully engage in her community. “That’s what this is all about,” Dr. Coelho says. “We’re using technology to transform possibilities for our patients.”

Defining Realities

The term “extended reality” encompasses three emerging technologies: virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality.

Illustrations by Jason Schneider

Virtual Reality

Virtual reality (VR) technologies are fully digital simulated environments, typically accessed via an immersive headset and sometimes including haptic feedback gloves to allow for environmental interaction.

Augmented Reality

Augmented reality (AR) refers to cases where digital elements are projected onto the real environment, typically using a screen interface or headset.

Mixed Reality

Mixed reality (MR) combines virtual and real elements, such as in training simulations that project virtual models over real surgical dummies to enhance the learning experience.

Virtual Care in Critical Moments

Neurosurgeon Rabih Tawk, M.D., believes that these technologies can, and should, be applied to every field. “Every surgeon is always learning,” he says. “Every patient is different, with unique needs. These simulations provide a valuable new platform for surgical planning, tailoring the approach for everyone. Why shouldn’t all surgeons plan this way?”

Dr. Tawk uses a system called Immersive Touch, consisting of virtual reality goggles and hand controllers, to plan complex aneurysm surgeries. These tools allow him to create detailed 3D visualizations of the surgery site using patient brain scans, providing clearer insights into the patient’s anatomy than could be gleaned from simply looking at static 2D angiograms. These insights, in turn, allow him to generate a precise treatment plan.

Even outside of the operating room, these tools are changing how clinicians collaborate to provide care. Neurointensivist William D. Freeman, M.D., listed a multitude of ways that virtual reality is used in his field, including the use of virtual reality to enable rapid case review and consultations with remote specialists — critical for time-sensitive stroke care.

“In some places, hospitals are even using minimally invasive robots and remote controls in collaboration with on-site care providers so surgeons can place stents in stroke patients completely remotely,” he says. “These tools provide opportunities for expert care even in locations where a clinician of the right specialty is not available on-site.”

With the advancement of 6G technology, which allows for nearly instantaneous transmission of high volumes of data, Dr. Freeman sees a rapid evolution in remote surgical collaboration. In the future, he imagines that Mayo Clinic experts will participate in “4D surgeries,” with multiple surgeons in more than one location working to care for a patient together in three-dimensional virtual space, across the fourth dimension of time.

Advancements in data transmission technology will also enable “holoportation,” allowing remote specialists to participate virtually in consultations or medical procedures via realistic 3D hologram projections. At Mayo Clinic, this could mean that a specialist in Rochester appears to be standing beside a surgical team member in Arizona or Florida, providing guidance in real time while maintaining the feel of a natural face-to-face interaction.

While this may sound like science fiction, to Dr. Freeman, it’s simply the next step in ensuring that patients get the care they need, whenever and wherever they need it.

A Powerful Pairing

Combined with other advanced technologies, such as AI, extended reality tools are propelling surgery into the next century. “These technologies complement each other perfectly,” explains Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo. “AI helps us see and understand patterns in thousands of surgeries, while extended reality lets us apply those insights with unprecedented precision.”

In practice, this partnership begins long before the first incision. AI algorithms analyze vast databases of surgical outcomes to help design patient-specific implants and suggest optimal surgical approaches based on each patient’s unique anatomy. The technology can identify subtle variations that might affect surgical success.

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In the operating room, AI technology processes and interprets imaging data from multiple sources, generating the real-time visualizations that surgeons use via their AR headsets. AI systems can also track and analyze surgical performance metrics, providing instantaneous feedback during training simulations, and allowing trainees and their teachers to track progress against established benchmarks.

These advances are particularly crucial for remote surgery, where Mayo Clinic is pioneering new approaches. Advanced AI filters act as digital stabilizers for robotic surgical systems, eliminating tiny tremors or delays that could impact precision. “These safety systems are essential,” explains Dr. Freeman. “They ensure that even if there’s a minor connectivity hiccup, the robotic system remains steady and precise.”

The Reality of Implementation

Like any emerging technology, there are practical challenges to consider — some of which can be addressed simply by changing the room’s lighting. “The system requires specific environmental conditions to work optimally,” says Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo. “Very bright operating room lights can make it difficult to see the holograms, and certain colors of surgical gloves can interfere with the system’s tracking capabilities. You need a reliable internet connection, and you have to be ready to adapt if the technology experiences issues.”

Some more traditional surgeons have expressed concerns about overreliance on technology. Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo emphasizes the importance of maintaining clinical judgment alongside technological proficiency. “You still have to have common sense and be ready to adjust if the plan doesn’t work out,” he says. “These tools enhance our capabilities, but they don’t replace the need for surgical expertise and decision-making.”

In addition, the financial barriers to adoption can be significant. For institutions in underserved areas, these costs can be prohibitive. However, Dr. Freeman points to reduced recovery times as a benefit that offsets these costs. “Preoperative planning reduces complications during surgery and shortens hospital stays,” he says. “Shortening a patient’s length of stay in the ICU by even a day saves thousands of dollars. The cost-effectiveness ratio is quite favorable. These tools are investments that pay off in better patient outcomes and lower overall costs.”

Personalizing Care Beyond Physical Boundaries

These technologies represent more than just tools — they’re part of a new frontier in personalized medicine. Through Mayo Clinic Platform, healthcare’s first true platform, solution developers are exploring vast datasets and sophisticated AI models to detect diseases earlier, optimize therapies and generate more accurate diagnoses. When combined with extended reality tools, this creates unprecedented opportunities to tailor care to each patient’s unique needs.

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But perhaps most transformative is how these technologies are breaking down barriers to accessing expert care. Dr. Sanchez-Sotelo has seen this firsthand. “In many parts of the world, patients don’t have access to surgeons with expertise in complex procedures,” he says. “Now, I can virtually step into an operating room anywhere in the world. I can guide another surgeon in real time, showing them exactly where to place instruments, helping them develop new skills. We’re not just treating today’s patient — we’re helping doctors provide better care for all their future patients.”

These technologies demonstrate that distance need not be a barrier to receiving the highest level of care, that expertise can be shared instantly across continents, and that the future of medicine is both highly technical and deeply human.

“If I’m the patient, I want that top specialist for my critical condition available immediately,” says Dr. Freeman. “These technologies make that possible. They allow us to bring Mayo’s expertise directly to patients, wherever they are, whenever they need it. That’s not just innovation — it’s transformation.”

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Delfina

“Post-COVID, maternal health is the public health challenge of our time,” says Senan Ebrahim, M.D., Ph.D., the CEO of Delfina — referencing the fact that the U.S. maternal mortality rate is nearly twice as high as that of other high-income countries. Delfina is on a mission to change this.

The app the company has created enables users to monitor their physical and mental health as pregnancy progresses and alerts them to any risks. It also provides services that make the pregnancy experience smoother. For example, users can contact a doula who can answer questions about everything from prenatal vitamins to the best places to buy maternity swimwear.

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First and foremost, though, is Delfina’s commitment to protecting the health of mothers and babies. Dr. Ebrahim highlights the experience of a patient in Texas who realized — thanks to the app’s remote monitoring capabilities — that her blood pressure had shot up. She contacted her physician, who promptly sent her to the emergency room. There, it was discovered that she had developed gestational hypertension. She was induced and had a safe vaginal delivery the same day. “She and her physician both attribute that great outcome to Delfina,” Dr. Ebrahim says.

The Accelerate program was vital in ensuring the success and growth that Delfina is experiencing. “It’s not every day that a top academic institution opens its doors to a company that hasn’t even existed for a year and says, ‘Yeah, let’s help you make sure the product you’re going to put out into the world meets the very highest clinical, scientific and safety standards,’” Dr. Ebrahim says. “Mayo brought in experts to show us how to build this product in a best-in-class way that’s safe for patients. That gave us the confidence to take these models out to market.”

Delfina now envisions a future where they’re able to provide long-term support to patients, optimizing their health from before they conceive through the postpartum period. With offices in New York City, Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Rochester, Minnesota, Delfina is growing — and supporting Mayo Clinic’s goal of making the area around its Rochester campus a hub for tech innovation and entrepreneurship in the Midwest.

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This commitment is seen in the industry-leading integration of automation and artificial intelligence, in major investments like Mayo Clinic Platform and Bold. Forward. Unbound., and in thousands of daily interactions between patients and their Mayo Clinic physicians and nurses.  

Patients from every state and 135 countries turned to Mayo Clinic for care last year. Their belief in the organization as the leader in healthcare was reinforced in U.S. News & World Report’s "Best Hospitals" rankings for 2025-2026, which Mayo Clinic led for the 36^th time since the rankings began.

Both Mayo Clinic in Rochester and Mayo Clinic in Arizona were members of the U.S. News Honor Roll, which evaluates hospitals across 15 specialties and 22 procedures and conditions. Mayo Clinic is the only healthcare organization with two hospitals to achieve this designation. 

Philanthropy plays a critical role in these rankings and Mayo Clinic’s transformation of healthcare. Benefactors change the lives of patients, such as those in Cancer Care Beyond Walls, Mayo Clinic’s innovative at-home chemotherapy program. 

In 2024, Mayo Clinic received a record $1.117 billion in philanthropic gifts and future commitments and has received several transformative gifts in 2025, including recent contributions to support the Mayo Clinic Berg Innovation Exchange and Bold. Forward. Unbound. in Arizona. 

Mayo Clinic again ranks No. 1 in the U.S. News state rankings for Minnesota and Arizona and continues to be the top hospital in the Jacksonville metro area. Mayo Clinic Health System in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, has also been recognized as a Best Regional Hospital in Northwestern Wisconsin.

The post Mayo Clinic’s Commitment to Patients, Innovation Reinforced by U.S. News Rankings appeared first on Mayo Clinic Magazine.