After 42 years working in the medical field and 11 years at Sanford Health of Bemidji, Joy Johnson has retired from her position as the vice president of operations.

In those 11 years, Johnson worked with the other executives at Sanford to grow Bemidji from a local health center to a regional one. It took those years to make the changes necessary.

Johnson says her proudest accomplishment in her time was developing an interventional cardiology program to save those suffering from heart attacks.

By — Betsy Melin