Nathan K. Evanson, MD, PhD

I have always been a scientist at heart, and I entered medicine as a way to be a scientist. My interactions with patients and families during medical training awakened a love of clinical medicine that I continue with today.

I enjoy rehabilitation medicine because it is a broad specialty with many unexplored frontiers. I love working with children because they have so much life ahead of them, and I believe improvements early on will lead to long-term improvements in their lives.

As a rehabilitation doctor, I treat a spectrum of brain injuries, from complex concussions through severe debilitating brain injuries. These conditions include acquired brain injuries such as traumatic brain injury, stroke, inflammatory injuries and others.

Brain injury treatment requires a team approach, which includes patients, parents, physicians, therapists and many others. I believe in listening to families for their perspectives and in having them participate in making care decisions. I want to help families understand treatment options, then help them decide what approaches will work with their family situation.

In addition to helping patients and their families, I am also involved in research. The core problem I am trying to understand is how brain injuries impair brain metabolism, energy handling and cellular stress, and what can be done to correct these impairments.