Winter 2025 Newsletter
Slocum Research & Education Foundation
New Website Alert!
We are so happy to introduce the new Slocum Research & Education Foundation website!
This change enables us to fully control our own content, share news more easily, and facilitate events. Thank you very much to our wonderful team member John Over for building out this new site!
Use any of the links below to explore the site:
Education and Community Benefit Updates
33rd Annual Orthopedic & Sports Medicine Update
On December 6th, 2025 we hosted our 33rd Annual Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Update!
This was our biggest event of this decade with 94 attendees and wonderful presenters from Slocum Orthopedics and the Knight Campus.
We started the day with a plenary talk by Julia Harrer from the Willet Regenerative Labs at the Knight Campus whose post-doctoral research focuses on promoting bone regeneration through 3D printing technology and innovative rehabilitation techniques. She brought this extensive expertise to help us uncover the science behind common myths in orthopedics.
Slocum Physical Therapist Cat Ebert and Physicians Jenna Godfrey, Gerald Aggrey, Blake Dowdle, Monica Zilkoski, and Julian Klosowiak led the group through musculoskeletal exams, case presentations, and a panel discussion to explore and debunk many common myths and misconceptions within the clinical practice space.
Thank you to Brian and Cheryl Gesik and the team at McKenzie Crossing Orthopedic Physical Therapy for their generous support of this event!
Slocum Orthopedics Scholarship Program
Applications for the Slocum Orthopedics Emerging Health Professionals of Lane County Scholarship Program will be open December 15th, 2025 through March 29th, 2026.
This program aims to support future healthcare professionals by awarding a limited number of one-time, $1,500 scholarships to graduating Lane County high school seniors who have been accepted into an accredited college or technical program. The Scholarship Program is focused on supporting well-rounded high school seniors who plan to pursue a career in healthcare, health-related research, public or community health.
Visit the scholarship program section of our website for more information and to apply!
Duck Parking
Our final Duck Parking fundraiser of the season will take place on Saturday, December 20th as the Oregon Ducks take on the James Madison Dukes in the first round of the College Football Playoffs.
So far year we have been able to support 12 local athletic programs and one community partner, raising nearly $40,000 to reduce the barrier for local students to participate in athletics. Thank you to all of our parking patrons for your support and a huge thank you to our Foundation team member Ellie DeLoretto for coordinating and running this event!
Healthy Moves community partner, beneficiary of the 10/25 Duck Parking event.
Thurston HS Tennis team, beneficiary of the 8/30 Duck Parking event.
Healthy Moves Fall Fundraiser
Slocum and The Slocum Foundation showed up in full force for the Healthy Moves Fall Fundraiser this year! Seventeen representatives from the Foundation staff, Foundation Board of Directors, and Slocum Orthopedics dedicated their Friday evening to supporting this fantastic community organization. For more information about Healthy Moves and their work in our local school system, please visit their website linked here.
Perry Initiative Outreach Program
On Saturday March 14th, 2026 the Slocum Foundation will post the Perry Outreach Program along with presenters and volunteers from Slocum Orthopedics, the UO Knight Campus, and Western University of Health Sciences!
The Perry Outreach Program exposes high school students to careers in orthopedic surgery and engineering. The program features hands-on mock orthopedic surgeries, biomechanical engineering experiments, and interactive talks from engineers and surgeons.
If you know a female-identifying high school student in the Eugene area who might be interested in attending, please direct them to Hannah College at hannah.college@slocumfoundation.org for more information.
Scientific Updates
The Foundation recognizes the enduring efforts of our Associate Director Tessa Kirkpatrick and Slocum Surgeon Dr. Rudolf Hoellrich as they reach a huge research study milestone!
Tessa has coordinated the enrollment and collection of long-term follow up data on 400 patients who have received an anatomic total shoulder arthroplasty from Dr. Hoellrich and clinical care from his team Kip Colvey, PA and Tara Ferley, CMA. Tessa’s hard work and persistence to follow these patients is unparalleled across the study, earing our study team #1 for compliance across this multi-center study.
Congratulations to the clinical and research teams on this huge achievement!
This Fall, Nataliia Shchotkina, PhD presented on Patient-Specific Synovial Fluid Microenvironments as Drivers of Cartilage Degeneration in Post-Traumatic Osteoarthritis at the International Cartilage Regeneration and Joint Preservation Society meeting in Boston.
Slocum authors Drs. Brick Lantz, Rudolf Hoellrich, Brian Jewett, and Blake Dowdle have been working with Nataliia and other researchers from the Lindberg Lab at the UO’s Knight Campus to collect surplus surgical tissue for this study over the past few years. The work presented here is an exciting outcome of the collaboration between Slocum’s Research team and the Lindberg Lab at the Knight Campus.
Congratulations Nataliia on this recognition of your excellent work!
Reference: Patient-Specific Synovial Fluid Microenvironments as Drivers of Cartilage Degradation in Post-Traumatic Osteoarthritis. Nataliia Shchotkina, Matthew J. Hofmann, Tim Wheeler, Sanique M. South, Yan Carlos Pacheco, Malley Gautreaux, Brick Lantz, Rudolf Hoellrich, Brian Jewett, Blake Dowdle, Tessa Kirkpatrick, Kate Spitzley, Nick J. Willett, Gabriella Lindberg. Podium presentation at the 18th ICRS Word Congress 2025. October 11-15, 2025. Boston, MA, USA.
Congratulations to our collaborator Knight Campus Cora Ferguson for being awarded an International Foundation for Ethical Research (IFER) Fellowship!
Cora is completing a PhD in bioengineering with Drs. Nick Willett and Gabby Lindberg at the UO’s Knight Campus and has been collaborating with Slocum surgeons since 2023. Slocum Orthopedics Sports Medicine Surgeon Dr. Blake Dowdle serves on Cora’s doctoral dissertation committee, providing a clinical perspective and guidance to this research. Tissue collected at Slocum Orthopedics supports Cora’s work engineering cartilage microphysiological systems to better understand how hormones influence joint integrity.
The video shared here highlights Cora’s wonderful research and underscores the importance of collaboration.
IFER is leading the way to advance new paths to replace and reduce the use of animals in research and testing. Learn more about the mission of the IFER here
Congratulations to Slocum physicians Jenna Godfrey and Jason Tavakolian, the Slocum Foundation’s past Executive Director Erin Owen, and prior Slocum Foundation interns John Benda and Won Jin Choi for their recent publication in HAND!
This work explores the cost saving potential of conducting endoscopic carpal tunnel release procedures using local anesthesia with the patient wide awake as compared to under monitored anesthesia care.
Dr. Daniel Fitzpatrick presents results from a highly collaborative OTA grant funded study.
In 2022, Dr. Daniel Fitzpatrick was awarded a research grant from the Orthopaedic Trauma Association to explore the utility of iPhone gait metrics in monitoring functional recovery following ankle fracture. Over the past three years, research teams at Slocum and our collaborators at Vanderbilt University have been busy collecting and analyzing iPhone gait data and patient reported outcome data from 107 patients. This year, Dr. Fitzpatrick was able to share the results from this work at the OTA’s annual meeting in Phoenix!
Thank you to our wonderful collaborators at Vanderbilt University, University of Oregon, and University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine for your work on this project!
Reference: iPhone Gait Metrics Benchmark Functional Recovery After Ankle Fracture. Daniel C. Fitzpatrick, MD, MS; Michael Hahn, PhD; S. Blake Dowdle, MD; Brandon G. Wilkinson, MD; Nicholas Strasser, MD; Tessa Kirkpatrick, BS; Cindy Headlee; Ellie DeLoretto, BS; Leila Hollis, MS, Kate Spitzley, PhD, Erin Owen, PhD, MPH. Poster presentation at the 2025 meeting of the Orthopaedic Trauma Association. Phoenix, AZ, USA.
Thank you for reading! Keep an eye out for future updates in our Spring 2026 Newsletter.
