Serving a Diverse Community

Our emergency department community prides ourselves on serving the diverse population of Hennepin County. Over 70% of the patients we serve identify as belonging to underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, with 40% of our patients identifying as Black, 25% as Latine, and 6% as American Indian.  Over 20% of our patients prefer to communicate in a language other than English and 1/3 of our patients are experiencing housing instability. Our multidisciplinary team of providers, nurses, social workers, interpreters, and clinical coordinators work in tandem to care for our patients and support them in all aspects of their lives and our mission is to create a workforce to reflect this population we serve.

The purpose of the HCMC Emergency Medicine JEDI Collaborative is to intentionally promote a culture that embodies and values justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion within the Hennepin County Medical Center Emergency Department. We plan to achieve this through intentional education, advocacy, outreach, and recruitment. 

To achieve this mission, we are actively working to identify and recruit residents who will contribute to the diversity of our EM community and to provide equitable support for the residents we recruit. We provide education for staff on diversity, equity, and inclusion with a focus on diverse voices and perspectives. We engage in outreach activities with multicultural communities. We pursue this work with a goal of promoting the richness of human differences and fostering an environment of acceptance and inclusiveness.

In addition to our standard medical student rotations, we also offer five externships for underrepresented minority students interested in completing visiting rotations in the Emergency Department at HCMC.  Each Diversity Extern receives a $2000 scholarship to help cover expenses related to airfare and housing during their rotation.  This externship is available to all 4th-year students who self-identify as belonging to a group underrepresented in medicine and are planning to pursue a career in Emergency Medicine.

Students selected for the Diversity Externship will complete the same clinical and didactic training as our standard student rotation and will have the added opportunity to participate in diversity, equity, and inclusion experiences, including, but not limited to JEDI Collaborative meetings, URM brunch or dinner hosted by URM residents, and shadow with services and community resources dedicated to improving equity and decreasing social forces of disease. Additionally, Diversity Externs are paired with a dedicated faculty and resident mentor throughout their rotation.

Applications for the annual Diversity Externship will open at the end of January each year and will be available through the Clinician Nexus site. The deadline for applications is April 1st of each year.

For any rotation-related questions, please email Taresa.Sawh@hcmed.org. If you have any general questions regarding Diversity at Hennepin EM, please email hennepin.em.diversity@gmail.com.  

• Our chair, Dr. Wyatt, (one of the first tribal enrolled people to lead an academic emergency department in the U.S) states that more diverse staff and public health approach helps patients: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2024/08/03/hennepin-healthcares-new-emergency-chair-talks-diverse-staff
• Our chair, Dr. Wyatt, featured in The Circle News: https://thecirclenews.org/cover-story/dr-wyatt-heads-em-for-hennepin-healthcare/
• Talent Garden – Hennepin Healthcare’s program that aims to nurture young health care providers of color: https://sahanjournal.com/health/hennepin-healthcare-talent-garden-internships/
• Resident and JEDI committee co-chair Morgan highlighted in the Indigenous match: https://www.forbes.com/sites/victorlopez-carmen/2023/03/19/a-match-made-indigenous-celebrating-10-incoming-native-resident-physicians/
• Article on our Black Youth with Stethoscope Summit:  https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/02/18/to-address-health-disparities-hennepin-healthcare-turns-to-local-youth
• Video highlighting our American Indian Youth with Stethoscopes Summit: https://youtu.be/z4DjbC9QI4U
• Our faculty, Dr. Andrea Dreyfuss, cofounded the nonprofit Ondas de Latinoamerica; it has the mission of training the leader of POCUS in Latin America in safety net hospitals. Our residents have opportunities to go to different sites in Latin America on elective: www.ondasdelatinoamerica.org
• Members of our prehospital care describe their innovative program of prehospital suboxone: https://www.fox9.com/news/hennepin-ems-to-carry-suboxone-for-treating-opioid-withdrawal-on-ambulances
• Current resident Dr. Hamdi Sheikh Said is the Community Service Director for Somali American Medical Association (SAMA)  https://www.samadocs.org/hamdi-sheikh-said
• Our Hennepin lifer Dr. Aaron Robinson gets a distinguished award: https://www.uwosh.edu/today/124557/uw-oshkosh-biology-alumnus-robinson-will-receive-2024-distinguished-alumni-award/
• An interview with Dr. Haylee Veazey, ED faculty member and the direction of the Adult Gender and Sexual Health clinic at HCMC:  https://umedia.lib.umn.edu/item/p16022coll97:170
• Interview in Spanish with our very own Dr. Andrea Dreyfuss about her work in Latin America: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqqY-QQn_B4&t=85s
• Dr. Andrea Dreyfuss shares her immigration story and why she chose a career in safety net hospitals, given she was featured in the book “Immigrant are us” by Mark Tuschman  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laVKvjdji1Q

Resources in Our ED

To learn more about resources available to patients in our Emergency Department, please see the following links.

• Community Paramedics
• YourPath
• NextStep
• Interpreter Services