About Us

The Center for Weight Management is a service of St. Joseph's Area Health Services and Essentia Health, with facilities located in Park Rapids, a growing, rural resort community in northwest Minnesota.

Patients come from North Dakota, Wisconsin, from all corners of Minnesota, and even Canada to undergo weight-loss surgical procedures at the Center for Weight Management.

Our recently unveiled medical center is the result of a 2-year $26 million building and renovation project. New state-of-the-art operating rooms and a recently renovated, nine-bed surgical unit designed exclusively for bariatric surgery patients keep care on the cutting edge.

The Center for Weight Management has been designated a Center of Excellence by the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS) since November 2005.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield (BCBS) of Minnesota and the BCBS Association named the Center for Weight Management a Blue Distinction Center for Bariatric Surgery in April 2008.