Top Doctors 2022: Delivering Better Outcomes

The future of critical care for mothers and newborns.

by

Safeguarding the health of patients strikes at the heart of any doctor’s work. But for physicians who take care of pregnant women, especially those who may have complicating health issues or a complex pregnancy, the stakes are even higher. They have two lives—or more—on the line. Whether a doctor is an obstetrician-gynecologist, perinatologist (high-risk pregnancies), neonatologist (fragile babies), or a pediatrician, these physicians play a major role in fostering the health and wellness of moms and babies. And they are by families’ sides during the good times, the growth spurts, and the challenges when difficulties emerge at birth or later in life. This year, we talked with professionals about the changes they’ve seen and what’s coming next in their fields. Read on to discover more than 800 local top doctors from 46 specialties who have been selected through a process involving extensive research and peer review.

In general, it’s good to be a child in Minnesota. The state ranks in the top 10 for healthy babies and children, with 92.5 percent of children ages 0 to 17 in excellent or very good health, according to the 2019–2020 National Survey of Children’s Health. However, such outcomes are not equal among all residents.

There are gaping disparities for different populations when it comes to maternal mortality during pregnancy or up to a year after childbirth, according to the Minnesota Department of Health. U.S.–born Black women are 2.8 times more likely to die during pregnancy, delivery, or one year postpartum compared to non-Hispanic white women, and Native American mothers are 7.8 times more likely to die during that same period. The same holds true for preterm births—babies born before 37 weeks—with Minnesota earning a B- from the annual March of Dimes Report Card on the health of moms and babies in the United States. For example, the preterm birth rate among Native American women in Minnesota is 62 percent higher than the rate among all women.

These disparities are on the minds of many physicians, including Dr. Cresta Jones, a maternal-fetal medicine and addiction medicine specialist at University of Minnesota Physicians, M Health Fairview. “The thing that keeps me up at night is the continuing high rate of maternal mortality in the United States,” she says. “When you look at where we sit compared to other developed countries, and when you think about the great health care we have, we have not been able to move the needle significantly on reducing mortality surrounding childbirth.”

Many factors influence the health of moms and babies, including conditions like high blood pressure or obesity and access to high-quality and consistent health care before, during, and after delivery. Learn how local doctors are working to improve health and wellness for all.

Preparing for the Unexpected

Dr. Mark Bergeron’s plan to become a family physician lasted about 15 minutes into his medical school pediatric rotation. A neonatologist summoned him to help deliver premature triplets, and he was immediately hooked on a profession that cares for the most fragile babies.

He views his role as guiding families through highly stressful and life-changing situations that often start before birth and continue for weeks, months, or years afterward. But no matter the difficulties unfolding in the NICU after a baby is born, Bergeron seeks to remember the significance of the milestone event: “We have to keep that as a focus. We have a job to do, and part of that is celebrating that a baby was born, no matter how small and complex and fragile,” says Bergeron, who emphasizes this outlook with medical trainees. “The first thing we should say to parents is congratulations. It’s not our job to take away hope, but it’s to project hopeful optimism whenever possible. We aim to be on the journey with these families.”

Neonatologists like Bergeron get involved when a medical challenge is identified in utero. As much as possible, a multidisciplinary team attempts to address problems before the baby is born, such as performing cardiac surgery or repairing spina bifida complications. Bergeron partners with maternal-fetal medicine physicians to keep women pregnant as long as possible and create plans for a baby’s arrival, whenever that might happen. And when there is an unexpected preterm birth or a newborn with complications, Bergeron and the Children’s Minnesota team step in to help.

Dr. Mark Bergeron is a neonatal and perinatal physician at Children’s Minnesota, where he serves as medical director of the Special Care Nursery on the Minneapolis campus and the Children’s Neonatal Virtual Care program and outreach. He's also medical director at the Level III NICU at Mercy Hospital.

That help doesn’t end when the infant goes home. Bergeron works to make sure such newborns go on to lead healthy lives. He continues to see patients through their first months, following up with them and their pediatricians regularly until preschool. He also looks at infant health from a public health lens and emphasizes the need for access to good health care before conception and during pregnancy.

“So many patients come into the system with compromised access to health care,” Bergeron says. Often, social factors like unstable housing, food insecurity, transportation issues, or language barriers play a role, too. “Those social determinants of health—and addressing where we are not meeting their needs—have a significant impact on maternal-fetal health. Healthy moms equal healthy babies.”

Medical innovation to improve patient care is a big part of Bergeron’s work. Before telemedicine became the norm during COVID, he led the development of the Children’s Minnesota Neonatal Virtual Care program in 2018. It connects Children’s Minnesota specialists with nine rural hospitals in Minnesota and Wisconsin. They provide in-the-moment expertise that helps clinicians stabilize sick infants and preterm babies immediately after birth.

Bergeron and his team are also working toward earlier discharge in the nurseries. One Children’s Minnesota initiative, CHAMP (Children’s Home App-Based Monitoring Program), allows preterm infants meeting certain criteria to transition home faster with monitoring and a feeding tube. It’s been wildly successful with great outcomes for the infants and their families, he says.

Workdays (or nights) can be stressful in the NICU. Bergeron gets energy from coworkers, being by families’ sides, and working together to get infants home. “I have learned over the years that these babies that are fragile are incredibly resilient,” Bergeron says. “They surprise you with their ability to get better. I have seen so many miracles, if you want to call them that, because babies defy the odds. It’s the richness of being a neonatologist.”

Elevating Care for Newborns and Families

For 31 years, neonatologist Dr. Catherine Bendel has taken care of babies that need extra attention after birth: preemies, those born with birth defects, and newborns facing significant health challenges. She also makes a macro impact through her work training future physicians and doing research.

What are some of your challenges at work? When you’re working in pediatrics, you are dealing with a family unit. I’m always worried about providing the best care for our patients, but I also worry about making certain that we’re really caring for the family and communicating adequately with them. I worry about our really complex children and how we are going to get them safely home, and how we are going to help these families navigate the health care system if they have a child with special needs.

How do you help families through their experience in the NICU? I try to be honest and let them ask really specific questions so that I know what they need to know instead of launching into what I’d want to know. I want to figure out their most important concern so we can address that right away. We talk about what we can do in the NICU and how the vast majority of babies survive and do well. I try to prepare them for how long it might be and some of the challenges ahead. But most of all, it’s trying to be as honest and reassuring and as optimistic as the situation allows.

What extra challenges do families from disadvantaged communities face? The challenge of just having an infant in the NICU for a really long time, and maybe not having paid maternity leave or having paid leave that will allow them enough time to also care for the child when the child comes home. Getting to and from the hospital or finding boarding when the hospital is full. We try to have support for our families. Masonic Children’s Hospital rented apartments across the street that we can make available to families that need to be closer to their children. We serve the whole Upper Midwest, and there are issues for lower socioeconomic and marginalized individuals from outstate Minnesota as well.

Dr. Catherine Bendel is a neonatal-perinatal physician at M Health Fairview University of Minnesota Masonic Children’s Hospital, an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota, and director of the Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine and Pediatric Fellowship Programs.

What sustains you in a stressful job? What always gives me hope and joy in my work is that in the end, most of our babies leave the NICU and do very, very well with limited limitations. A small percentage have severe limitations. They have an underlying disease, and this would have been the outcome no matter what. It’s a huge reward for all of us when a family is getting to bring their child home, and when they come back and show us their babies at six months or a year and we see how well they are doing. And when I see the trainees mastering the skills and learning what they need to know to navigate the NICU, that gives me joy and keeps me going.

What do you enjoy about research? You can work on something as rewarding as sending home one individual patient. But if you have a breakthrough or contribute to a large study that has a breakthrough, you can have an effect on hundreds of thousands of patients. That is super rewarding, even if you just had a small part of it. At the university, part of what we do in fellowship is teach trainees how to contribute to scholarship activity. You are training not just the next generation of clinicians but people who will have an impact on the research of the future as well.

Solving Disparities in Health Care

While in training to be an obstetrician-gynecologist, Dr. Lisa Saul realized that she most enjoyed helping women through complex pregnancies and investigating answers to complicated medical questions. She pursues such work these days as a hands-on perinatologist and health care leader who aims to improve care for women and children.

What types of patients do you see? Our practice and service line see a wide variety of patients from different races and ethnicities and language backgrounds. Over the last decade or so, there has been an increase in the number of patients that are classified as advanced maternal age, over 35. With that increase, we are seeing more pregnancies that are conceived with assistive reproductive technology. We do see a fair number of multiple gestation pregnancies, and that also adds to the risk. And then with the combination of the opioid crisis and unemployment rising since the onset of COVID, we are seeing more and more patients who struggle with addiction as well as housing and food insecurity.

Dr. Lisa Saul is a perinatologist at Minnesota Perinatal Physicians, takes care of women with high-risk pregnancies, and has served as president of the Mother Baby Clinical Service Line at Allina Health for nine years.

What are some of the disparities you see in health care? As we look at the data, we see differences in readmission rates for certain communities of color, and we see differences in blood loss at delivery. We also see differences in how emergency departments are utilized during pregnancy, depending on the ethnic group we’re looking at. We do see differences in breastfeeding rates in communities of color.

What do you enjoy about your work? I have the opportunity to impact many lives at once in my administrative job of leading the Mother Baby Clinical Service Line. I’ve been very fortunate to be able to impact many lives in the areas of quality, in areas affecting programs and services, and even interact with policymakers to elevate issues that are of concern to mothers and babies and families. On a clinical level, I have always enjoyed one-on-one interaction with patients. I enjoy getting to know families because there are no two families that are alike, and I do enjoy the role I get to play in helping to get the best possible outcome that we can for that family.

What changes would you like to see to improve care for moms and babies? I would want there to be an equal focus on the postpartum period as there is on the prenatal period. The six to 12 months postpartum can be particularly trying and detrimental for mothers. I would like there to be an opportunity for provider teams to engage with their patients up to a year postpartum to provide support in that period in the same way they do in the nine months prior to delivery.

“I WOULD WANT THERE TO BE AN EQUAL FOCUS ON THE POSTPARTUM PERIOD AS THERE IS ON THE PRENATAL PERIOD.”

~ Dr. Lisa Saul

What worries you about your patients? We’ve all seen the recent media attention on the increases in maternal mortality in Black and African American women, and as an African American woman who has an African American daughter, that is troubling to me. A main concern that many African American women have is that they are going to die while they are trying to give birth to their babies. That is just not a fear that anyone should have in the wealthiest nation in the world.

In conversations I have had with women and in the literature that I’ve read, women are not feeling that anyone is listening to them. It isn’t for a lack of awareness that something is happening to their body. It isn’t for a lack of raising the alarm to people who are caring for them. It is a lack of hearing what they are saying and demonstrating a response to that concern.

My passion right now is to get to that place of being able to marry what we know to be clinically true with what the patient is bringing to us about themselves and their experience so that the two of us can combine to effect better outcomes. If you ask me what keeps me up at night, it’s my concern that my 12-year-old daughter will be experiencing the same outcomes that women are today, and we haven’t done anything about it. To me, that would not be acceptable. This is not a problem that is unsolvable. It is solvable. But we have to have intentionality behind it.

What are some potential solutions? We are working on a project that will bring the voice of the patient to the entire care team through the electronic medical record. It will provide a way for the patient to specify their choices and their preferences and their fears to the care team in a way that’s visible. Then the care team can respond to it. The goal is that it will generate the conversations that are needed in the prenatal period to establish trust. A trusting relationship between the patient and the care team carries over into the hospital setting at the time of birth and then back into the clinic during the postpartum period. That’s the hope and the goal and the dream.

Diagnosing and Treating Genetic Conditions

Soon after babies are born in Minnesota, clinicians draw a tiny amount of blood from their heels to test it for more than 50 inherited and congenital disorders. When conditions ranging from sickle cell to cystic fibrosis are identified, the family gets referred to a physician like Dr. Susan Berry.

A medical geneticist, Berry has two parts to her job. She sees babies and children to diagnose genetic conditions if they test positive during the newborn screening or if they have birth defects or experience developmental delays. Berry counsels pediatric and adult patients on their diagnoses and provides treatments that help them live with their genetic disorder. Another aspect of her work is helping patients with inborn errors of metabolism, when one element of digestion that processes nutrients into energy doesn’t work properly. These conditions, like phenylketonuria or galactosemia, often can be treated with special diets. Some genetic conditions can be treated with enzyme infusions to address the error.

Dr. Susan Berry is a medical geneticist at the University of Minnesota, where she is a professor in the Division of Genetics and Metabolism in the Department of Pediatrics.

Berry works closely with genetic counselors to determine what genetic disease may be affecting a patient, piecing together an often-puzzling array of symptoms and test results. Her work can begin at the fetal stage, when a birth defect or abnormality is identified through ultrasound, or later, as parents or pediatricians notice developmental differences in babies or children.

“An important part of the care and evaluation we do is a careful physical exam, and we can recommend specific genetic tests that can provide a diagnosis and help us understand the underlying cause,” Berry says. “Some diseases are treatable, and many are not.”

Parents appreciate knowing what condition is affecting their children and learning how to care for them. A diagnosis also allows people to connect with other families who are experiencing the same disease. Though it can be difficult to give a diagnosis, especially if there is no cure, Berry gets resolve and purpose from her patients and their families.

“I’m like the old family doctor that takes care of family members all of their lives, and those relationships are very special. It’s a real privilege to be on their journey with them,” Berry says. “The ability to provide what I hope is useful information can really outweigh the downsides. I’m always impressed by human potential and what people can do and accept and learn—more than we think they can, even when they are impaired. I find that encouraging as well.”

Berry wasn’t set on medical school when she went to college, choosing between history and biochemistry. The idea of being able to make an impact on other people’s lives tipped the scales to medicine. During her pediatrics residency at the University of Minnesota, Berry trained with two early medical geneticists. Then she completed one of the first medical genetics fellowships in the country.

Doing research, serving as an advocate, and being a leader have been other important aspects of Berry’s work. She led the Minnesota chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics and recently was named to the board of the National Organization for Rare Disorders, the premier voice in the field.

It’s been an enormously satisfying time to work in genetics, Berry says, thanks to progress in diagnosing previously undiagnosable conditions and treating once-fatal diseases like spinal muscular atrophy with new RNA-based and gene therapy treatments. And then there are discoveries that emerged from the Human Genome Project, which will ultimately revolutionize drug and treatment capabilities. Berry adds, “We’re on the threshold of true therapy for genetic diseases.”

Reducing Childhood Risks and Injury

Dr. Andrew Kiragu followed his parents into medicine—his dad was a physician and mom a nurse—and a special connection with children led him to become a pediatrician. Passionate about providing excellent care for children in precarious health and injury prevention, Kiragu helped launch the national Injury Free Coalition for Kids in Minnesota. He also engages in research, most recently about pediatric injury trends during the COVID pandemic.

Dr. Andrew Kiragu is a pediatric critical care physician at Children’s Minnesota and an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota. A member of Children’s Respiratory and Critical Care Specialists group, he also sees patients at Gillette Children’s and Hennepin Healthcare.

What are some of the biggest health concerns children face now? One of the biggest challenges has been COVID. It has impacted children’s health, as we figured out that they can get sick from COVID and die from COVID, to the point where we’re now finding out about a new syndrome called multisystem inflammatory syndrome in kids. Then there is the impact of not being able to go to school and the socialization that comes from being in school, and the lack of access that children have to services they truly need and used to receive at school, such as speech therapy, occupational therapy, and counseling. Some need access to free meals. We have seen a significant increase in the number of kids who are struggling with mental health issues. And in the ICU, we’ve seen a spike in the number of kids who have been admitted after a suicide attempt, and unfortunately, some kids have died because of suicide.

What other risks do kids face? The leading cause of death in children over the age of 1 in the United States is injury. It’s anything from falls and motor vehicle crashes and recreational injuries to children being victims of violence, including suicide. In children less than 1, we’ve seen a lot of deaths from sudden unexplained infant death, which includes sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) and accidental asphyxiation and strangulation in bed (ASSB).On average, 3,400 infants die every year nationally from sudden unexplained infant death.

For people in disadvantaged communities, how do these risks get magnified? Traditionally, the rate of injuries in general, and everything like sudden unexplained infant death rates, are higher in communities of color. A lot of this correlates with poverty and where people live. Those disparities, whether it’s asthma or other illnesses, have been amplified during the pandemic. And of course, the pandemic has disproportionately impacted communities of color.

What are some of the most difficult parts of your job? Taking care of kids where something they are struggling with is something that was preventable. Injuries, for the most part, are preventable. There is a difference between that kid who chose to wear a helmet or who was belted when driving versus one that was not belted or wearing a helmet and the type of injuries each of those kids will sustain.

What are some of your biggest worries? Firearm-related injuries. A recent article in The New England Journal of Medicine showed that while we have been seeing a decrease in the rate of deaths from motor vehicle accidents with children, this has now been overtaken by the rate of deaths from firearms in children less than 19. There was a study last year in Pediatrics showing that during the pandemic, there was an increase in unintentional injuries and deaths from firearms in the age group 12 and younger. The author correlated that with FBI data showing that during the pandemic, people are buying more firearms, and kids are finding these weapons in their homes.

What gives you hope, even on bad days? What keeps me going are the kids. It can be difficult sometimes in the ICU, where we deal with the sickest children. We’re supporting families as they struggle with the real possibility that their child will die, and sometimes, sadly, the child does die. But kids are really resilient. We say, “That kid is titanium—you can’t break that one.” What keeps me going is seeing these kids get better, and every now and then having one of those kids come back and visit. I recently received this letter from a young woman I took care of 15 years go. She had a severe traumatic brain injury, and she just said she had been thinking about me and wanted to say thank you. That is truly meaningful, and it gives me the strength to keep going.

Working to Prevent High-Risk Pregnancies

As a physician who focuses on high-risk obstetrical care, Dr. Cresta Jones strives to find ways to improve the health of pregnant women. That ranges from preventing chronic conditions like diabetes from negatively affecting pregnancy to helping people with substance use disorders optimize health in their pregnancies.

How is maternal-fetal health faring in Minnesota? We are lucky to live in a state with overall relatively low maternal mortality rates. In the face of the pandemic, in Minnesota and the United States as a whole, there is finally recognition that there are a lot of disparities and racial inequality in who dies surrounding pregnancy. Structural racism and the social determinants of health can put people at a disadvantage coming into pregnancy, placing them at increased risk of complications and even dying. These inequities have not been improving.

What are the main contributors to high-risk pregnancies? Some of the biggest things we see are pregnant people coming in with chronic health conditions like high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and other comorbidities that put them at a higher risk of complications. We know that pregnant people have a significant risk for COVID-19 infection; we know that vaccination prior to or during pregnancy helps reduce that risk and vaccination is safe for the developing pregnancy. Data show that moms’ antibodies cross to babies and may reduce the chances of babies getting COVID-19 for some period of time after birth. Substance use in the United States has gone up dramatically during the global pandemic, with a 28 percent increase in overdose deaths in 2020 and a further 15 percent increase in 2021.

Dr. Cresta Jones is a maternal-fetal medicine and addiction medicine physician at University of Minnesota Physicians, M Health Fairview and an associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology, and women’s health at the University of Minnesota Medical School.

How can people prevent having a high-risk pregnancy? Primary care doctors are encouraged to ask  patients, “What are your thoughts on pregnancy in the next year?” and to encourage patients with higher-risk medical conditions to get a consult with a maternal-fetal medicine or obstetric health care provider before they get pregnant in case there are things that can be changed to improve pregnancy outcomes. We can work on getting their diabetes and blood pressure in control and  change any medications that might not be compatible with pregnancy. We’re placing more emphasis, in the last five to 10 years, on risk factors for pregnancy that we know are modifiable.

What gives you hope? I work with Ob-Gyn residents and medical students at the University of Minnesota. I see this amazing group of physicians and future physicians that is really committed to combatting and reducing inequities in health care and making a difference.

Why did you get involved in public health advocacy? It’s a natural progression from working in substance use disorder care. You see how some of the laws in Minnesota adversely affect the most vulnerable populations. In July 2021, a statute went into effect in Minnesota that eliminated mandatory substance abuse reporting for pregnant women. Previously, health care providers were required to report a patient to her county of residence if she reported substance use in pregnancy. This resulted in women who were struggling with substance use avoiding prenatal care because they were afraid that they would be reported and separated from their babies. I was able to advocate, along with other specialists in Ob-Gyn, pediatrics, and family medicine, to change this law. Now patients can disclose their substance use to a doctor and other care providers, establish a trusting relationship, and work together to access treatment while also continuing in prenatal care, which has been shown to reduce the risk of pregnancy complications even if substance use disorders are not yet completely treated.

A big thing I’m trying to impress on medical students and residents is how important their voices are. Taking time to write a letter to their legislator or governor about how they see an issue affecting the community—that’s how we get laws changed. It’s a pretty powerful thing.

Improving Brain Cancer Cure Rates

Pediatric neuro-oncologist Dr. Anne Bendel specializes in treating children and young adults with tumors of the central nervous system (CNS)—the brain and spinal cord. She also is an active researcher in pediatric CNS cancer, striving to discover more effective treatments to help improve cure rates and decrease long-term side effects.

What is the prognosis for kids with brain tumors? In the United States, 4,500 to 5,000 children are diagnosed with brain cancer [each year]. All pediatric CNS cancers combined have a cure rate as high as 70 to 75 percent, but some subtypes have a cure rate of 95 percent or higher, while others are less than 20 percent. It’s the second-most-common childhood cancer after leukemia but the leading cause of pediatric cancer deaths. We have more progress we need to make. We’re starting to see improvement in survival compared to five to 15 years ago, due to having a better understanding of the molecular and genetic changes within each CNS tumor, which allows us to better target the tumor with effective treatments.

What recent treatment advancements have you seen? With advances in surgery and radiation and other advances in technology, they have been able to do a better job of sparing the normal brain. When they do surgery, they are able to do functional MRIs to map the child’s speech, vision, and motor and sensory areas to avoid those areas during surgery. And they use DTI—diffusion tensor imaging—to visualize the nerve fibers so surgeons know what to avoid to prevent permanent neurological injury. More-focused radiation has improved the long-term risks of side effects due to lowering or omitting the dose of radiation delivered to the surrounding healthy tissue. Development of many new molecularly targeted treatments and immune-based treatments has improved the cure rate in some CNS tumors, often with fewer short- and long-term side effects.

What are your biggest work worries? Trying to make certain that I have found the best treatment options available for patients. I rack my brain and look at the genetic and molecular makeup of their tumors so that I can try to personalize patients’ therapy. I also try to figure out ways to potentially reduce some of the risks of therapy. Sometimes the best option is to choose a treatment option with a lower chance of a cure to give the child the best chance for a better cognitive outcome. The other thing is that we work with families who are frequently devastated emotionally and sometimes financially with their child’s situation. I’m trying to figure out how we can give the best comprehensive care to this child and their family so they can get through this treatment successfully in all respects.

What do you find most satisfying? It’s very rewarding to be able to get them through that experience and cured and to watch them grow up. If they have long-term complications or the tumor comes back, we make certain they get appropriate treatment, and we work to maximize their ability to be cured and healthy in their adult life. It’s also rewarding that it isn’t a stagnant field. Every day, we learn new things, and these new things will help us cure more kids in the future.

What have you been researching lately? We are excited about a clinical trial for a novel agent that we call tumor paint . You give it immediately prior to surgery to see if it will turn brain tumors fluorescent when you shine an infrared light on them. We’re studying whether it improves surgeons’ abilities to completely and safely remove tumors. We have also been involved in a study that uses a vaccine directed against a specific kind of deadly brain tumor with the goal to stimulate the immune system to recognize the tumor as foreign and kill it. Our hope is that by directly attacking tumors and training the immune system, we will have a better chance of curing tumors and have a long-acting immune response to prevent them from coming back. We’re also determining the molecular and genetic makeup of CNS tumors that cause activation and growth pathways within the cells, resulting in tumor development and growth. We’re testing an approach that targets those pathways with drugs, and we’re having amazing results.

2022 Annual Guide to Local Top Doctors

The 26th edition of our Top Doctors list includes 810 doctors in 46 specialties. Here’s how we put it together. When compiling a list that’s as relied upon as our annual Top Doctors list, research is essential. We asked physicians to nominate one or more doctors (excluding themselves) to whom they would go if they or a loved one were seeking medical care. From there, candidates were grouped into 46 specialties and evaluated on myriad factors, including (but not limited to) peer recognition, professional achievement, and disciplinary history. Doctors with the highest scores from each grouping were invited to serve on a blue-ribbon panel that evaluated the other candidates. It should be noted, doctors cannot pay to be included on this list, nor are they paid to provide input. Physicians are chosen using a patented multiphase selection process, combining peer nominations and evaluations with independent research. In the end, only doctors who acquired the highest total points appear on Mpls.St.Paul Magazine’s 2022 Top Doctors list. Of course, no list is perfect. Many qualified doctors providing excellent care are not included on this year’s list. However, if you’re looking for exceptional physicians who have earned the confidence and high regard of their peers, you can start your search here. In addition to the list you find here, this year’s group of Rising Stars will join a prestigious group of doctors from more than 20 cities around the country who have been selected to Super Doctors, the full list of which you can find at superdoctors.com.

Editor’s Note: Many of our Top Doctors have specialty certification recognized by the American Board of Medical Specialties. This board certification requires substantial additional training in a doctor’s area of practice. We encourage you to discuss this board certification with your doctor to determine its relevance to your medical needs. More information about board certification isavailable at abms.org. © 2022 MSP Communications. All rights reserved. 

© 2022 MSP Communications. All rights reserved. Super Doctors® is a registered trademark of MSP Communications. Disclaimer: The information presented is not medical advice, nor is Super Doctors a physician referral service. We strive to maintain a high degree of accuracy in the information provided. We make no claim, promise, or guarantee about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the information contained in the directory. Selecting a physician is an important decision that should not be based solely on advertising. Super Doctors is the name of a publication, not a title or moniker conferred upon individual physicians. No representation is made that the quality of services provided by the physicians listed will be greater than that of other licensed physicians, and past results do not guarantee future success. Super Doctors is an independent publisher that has developed its own selection methodology; it is not affiliated with any federal, state, or regulatory body. Self-designated practice specialties listed in Super Doctors do not imply “recognition” or “endorsement” of any field of medical practice, nor do they imply certification by a Member Medical Specialty Board of the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) or that the physician has competence to practice the specialty. List research concluded May 11, 2022.

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