The University of Minnesota is committed to supporting the health of communities through collaborative innovations to improve access to care in Minnesota and beyond, as outlined in the Elevate Extraordinary 2030 strategic roadmap.
Within the Masonic Institute for the Developing Brain, the Minnesota Tic and Compulsivity Lab (MnTiC Lab) is integrating research, clinical care, education and community engagement to serve Tourette patients and their families.
Opening windows and doors
“When I came to the University, there was no clinician group focused on Tourette at the whole institution,” says Christine Conelea, associate professor in the Medical School and principal investigator at the MnTiC Lab.
Nine years later, Conelea and her team of researchers have grown clinical care and research for young people with tics and compulsive disorders like OCD.
One to three percent of the population has Tourette Syndrome — a highly stigmatized disorder characterized by involuntary movements and vocalizations, commonly called tics. At the lab, staff are conducting compassionate, community-centered research and outpatient care to help diagnose, treat and support patients and their families. The lab also trains undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to grow their research practices and develop skills beneficial to future careers.
MnTiC Lab staff at TIC-CON, the world's largest conference focused on Tourette Syndrome and other Tic Disorders.
Along with in-person and online studies, the MnTiC Lab continues to develop new tools and treatments, such as a new video-based tool to help form tic disorder diagnosis and treatment monitoring with the vision of reaching those who do not have access to specialists in their area.
The lab is also pushing to break away from the physical confines of research to help more people. So far, the MnTiC Lab has had somebody from every state participate in an online study. And in recent years, they have grown their international reach by increasing their online presence and study offerings.
“The way that we integrate community engagement and advocacy and see it as integral to our science is both rewarding and a model for how we can be doing this in medicine more broadly,” says Conelea.
Serving what those with disorders deserve
Community-engaged research is a central element to the work of MnTiC Lab staff. By collaborating with patients, families, community members and other stakeholders on the research process — from conception to publication — people actually close the loop and get to learn what researchers are finding.
“Community-engaged research is fun,” says Carolyn Hunt, community engagement lead at MnTiC Lab. “It's valuable and not as hard as people might think to get out of a more typical or traditional way of doing research.”
The lab's mascot is an octopus because most of its neurons are in its tentacles, which coordinate with the brain. They view everyone on the team as an important tentacle that possesses its own autonomy that connects at the center.
One way this happens is through the Patient Advisory Board, a diverse group of representatives who meet monthly to bring forth questions, issues or trends related to tics and compulsive disorders. Through discussions, it became clear that outcomes prioritized for treatment differ between standard clinician training and those living with the condition. The lab is now conducting qualitative research to understand what those differences are and what patients care about in treatment.
“There are so many nuances that we learn that contribute both to providing better care and doing better research,” says Hunt.
Longstanding partnerships with local and national advocacy organizations also allow the lab to share its knowledge broadly and cement the great work coming out of Minnesota.
A one-of-a-kind recognition
Such advancement and care pushed the MnTiC Lab toward a National Center of Excellence designation from the Tourette Association of America (TAA) in February 2026. Spurred by nominations from families they’ve helped, the lab is the only one in Minnesota, 1 of 3 in the Midwest, and 1 of 27 in the country to receive this recognition.
“The TAA really understood our work, the vision, and the significance of the challenges of actually integrating clinical care with robust research and doing it all from a community-engaged perspective,” says Hunt.
Learn more about the Minnesota Tic and Compulsivity Lab.
This story was originally published by the University of Minnesota on April 28, 2026.
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