Read our expanded interview. This article appeared in Summer 2026 issue of Vision.

By Christina Capecchi Ries '00

Zoom isn’t Zooming for Dr. Madeleine Gagnon’s Tuesday morning meeting with managers, but she’s unfazed. “I’m just having one tech issue after another,” she says with a laugh. “How are y’all doing?” 

Perched in her sunlit home office, she’s armed with an array of low-tech resources—a highlighted calendar, a stack of Post-Its, a protein shake, a Vis tumbler with coffee—and she’s dialed in. Soon she’s reviewing all the logistics that make her business hum: payroll, hours, parent satisfaction. No detail is too small. 

A board-certified pediatrician turned business owner, Dr. Gagnon founded BRIDGE Health Consulting and BRIDGE To Home Services to help families navigate challenges (bridgehealthconsulting.com). She and her husband, Nima, are raising their twin boys in Minneapolis. 

You went from Vis to Notre Dame and then Georgetown. Do you credit Vis with helping to launch that prestigious path?

For sure. The reality is Vis is going to open doors at Notre Dame, and Notre Dame is going to open doors at Georgetown. I’m grateful for that. 

Both Georgetown and Notre Dame seemed easy academically after Vis. Vis prepared me well for those environments. I was never really stressing. 

How do you summarize Visitation’s impact? 

With hindsight, I appreciate my Vis education more and more. Vis made you believe that anything is possible.  

I was an average student in terms of raw talent, so the grades I got were work-based. No one ever said, “I don’t know if you’re smart enough to do that.” I felt like Vis really fostered: “You want to work hard, great!” That’s so much of life. It’s not about raw talent. It’s about the fortitude to stick with it and take rejection after rejection. 

You trained and practiced in some impressive places — from Children’s National in Washington, D.C., and Boston Children’s Hospital to leadership roles back home, at Gillette Children’s in St. Paul, where you created a complex-care unit. Then came your bold move: to pause your traditional medical career trajectory and found BRIDGE to Home Services. What inspired that?

I’d done so much complex care—kids on life support or feeding tubes or in a wheelchair. I thought the most interesting part was the parents’ journey and the amount of grief. It’s not a one-time deal. It’s: “Oh, they’re not in normal kindergarten,” “They’re not going to prom.” The grief that’s triggered by all those ages and stages. We can only do so much in the clinic. If we’re not translating this to help them be successful in real life, if we’re not supporting them in the home, it doesn’t really matter if we’ve gotten them to walk in their walker in clinic.    

So I opened BRIDGE to Home in 2000, and then the pandemic struck and everyone was home, which catapulted our success. It’s largely Medicaid—95 percent—working with kids and adults with disabilities, helping them develop life skills and navigate complex family dynamics, which then launched into mental health. 

That sounds so practical—and needed! 

It allows us to come in and be very creative and leverage the support we bring, taking care of these kids and dependents so their parents can go tend to their own needs—work, mental health, addiction.     

I really enjoy it, partly because my personality is very practical: “Let’s cut through the B.S. What’s going on? What’s the issue? What’s keeping you up at night?” I’m able to do that. In the clinic, there’s always a veil of formal, professional distance, which is important but can be paralyzing. You had a traumatic brain injury and you’re struggling in the classroom and the teacher is always calling the parents. There are so many pressures coming to an intersection. We’re able to do our small part to help alleviate some of those real-life tensions and be creative in how we approach them. 

I wanted to know who these families call when other agencies are able to serve them. How can they be more successful in the home? That led me to become a qualified mediator for families. There are very few mediators in the family space who are physicians. I think there are two others in Minnesota. Ispend most of my time on conflict resolution and parent-family dynamics. 

What are common causes of conflict after trauma? 

People feel so isolated. This accident happens and they don’t know 10,000 other people in the same boat. It’s often riddled with shame. Other times, their spouse handles it differently than they do. All sorts of things unravel like a ball of yarn.

BRIDGE To Home Services focuses on direct support for families. How did that work lead to the creation of BRIDGE Health Consulting?

I needed another vehicle to encapsulate this work. It’s really interesting work: coaching versus family therapy. Someone going through a divorce who needs expert information on vaccines or ADHD meds. A parent with a child with special needs and is grappling with their identity, or how to handle their other kids, or marital stress. A suicide attempt. A car accident. No matter what socioeconomic background you come from, trauma, disability and parenting cut deep. It brings everyone to their knees. Every parent says: I didn’t see this coming. 

I’ve helped thousands of families through major life traumas. I’m able to say: “This is normal. What can we do to redefine who you are? To navigate your grief?” 

From that experience, you founded a special initiative this year called PULSE, which is aimed at helping teens and their parents in supporting confidence, connection and wellbeing. What sparked it? 

I recognized a dearth of support and knowledge around preteens and teens. Those years are a critical time. It’s the footing for future addictions, future bad decisions, the desire to belong. 

A huge area where teens are struggling is a sense of belonging. Your sense of belonging can feel pretty shifty. You think your friends are your friends, but then you see a story on Instagram and they hung out and you were there and now you’re totally disoriented. 

Comparison culture is so hard. It looks like everything is so great for other people. And in the teenage brain, the frontal lobe is not fully developed, yet their hormones are surging, so you have a hormonal lead before brain development. 

It’s a recipe for disaster! 

There’s no single answer. That’s why I go back to communication and connection. If you foster that as a parent, there will still be storms coming, but at least you’ll be built for what’s coming, to try to weather it. As a parent, you have to talk about things that you’re not comfortable discussing. One in four to one in five teens consider suicide. If they know they can come to you, as uncomfortable as it may be, that open avenue is key—connection, not lecturing. 

Do you feel the weight of your work? 

I don’t feel weighted by it. I feel drawn to it and energized by it. No one is talking about preventative teen wellness. I’m so motivated to help. 

PULSE provides teens with college-aged mentors to provide a support system, including multiple Vis grads, right? 

We have at least five Vis grads, who are wonderful. PULSE college mentors help translate key messages. Any teen can join off social media. We make it free and easy. They just show up. It’s a place to ask questions, get good information and feel validated and heard.  

I’ve been so grateful for the Vis community because it’s been rife with people who are interested and self-motivated. I love the connection with Vis. 

None of this would’ve been possible if you didn’t have that entrepreneurial wiring, to imagine what could be and to build it. 

I was guided by two mottos. One is “Do it anyways.” Are you afraid of failure? Are you tired? Unsure? Do it anyways. And the second is “Don’t wait for success, start without it.” You have to just begin and take the next step. 

It’s been incredibly rewarding. In terms of sheer enjoyment, I’m able to impact so many households and figure out how to bring care creatively into their homes.

Being entrepreneurial-minded and founder-minded has always been my primary interest. I went to medical school largely influenced by having a sister with many medical needs. I think being a doctor has been a tool to serve me in understanding the needs and giving me credibility, which I’ve had to leverage from a power structure. 

It sounds like many Salesian virtues are fueling your work. 

All of them! Clearly kindness and gentle strength. Courage is key. Courage comes out in a multitude of ways. Having courage to pivot in a way that makes you happier in your 30s and 40s. I had the courage to say: “This is where I think my talents lie, and this is what energizes me.” It’s more social-justice based. I knew I wanted to serve people in a more real-world way. I knew I’d also be challenged. I knew people would look at me like: “You’re a doctor? You do this?”  

You anticipated that reaction? 

Yes. I had to be OK with being judged: “Oh, that’s different.” It’s not a path many doctors take. Being a doctor is safe. I get less misunderstood now because I’ve been successful, but I was more misunderstood at the beginning. The healthcare system is extremely restrictive, and the system is telling you how it’s done. 

You had to block out that noise and be really self-aware. 

I wasn’t not happy, but it wasn’t my jam. You know when you’re really feeling alive inside. Doing this meant turning down traditional healthcare leadership opportunities. You can’t get hung up on what everybody else is doing. Vis taught me that. If it doesn’t feel right for you, keep following that feeling. 

Let’s talk mental health. In many ways, it’s the issue of our day, isn’t it? 

It’s a huge issue. Whether it’s mental health, or wellness, or strength, it all falls into that cast. There’s been a 60 percent increase in diagnosed anxiety in the last decade. I think these issues have always been there, we’re just talking about them more and putting more medical and social attention on them. We have more tools to recognize it.  

I finished med school in 2009. Even then, we weren’t talking about pediatric mental health, pediatric depression or pediatric anxiety the way we are now. There’s an evolution. 

It should be an everyday dinner table topic. You can be a strong student, you can be a strong athlete, but if you’re struggling deeply with your mental health, it’s crippling. I want to help parents get more fluid so you can see your child for who they are versus who you want them to be. 
Versus who you were at that age, too.  

Yes! You might have to recognize: “Wait—my kid is having a struggle here. He’s a different learner than I was.” Seeing them for who they are and then figuring out what areas they need help with. Seeking help can be really hard. It can be tough to say: “OK, my kid needs a therapist.”

I don’t care how conservative or progressive you are, if you’re a parent and have to get a therapist for your kid because they’re struggling with anxiety, that first call is hard. You’re thinking, “Have I failed them?” But not leaning into the reality of your kid’s mental-health needs is far more dangerous. We have to normalize the human experience. It really helps when other people share their experiences.  

What do you personally do to guard your mental health?  

Number one: I have to get enough sleep. It impacts my processing so much, especially in this perimenopause era. 

Number two: getting outside is restorative. I walk the lake–it’s right there. Just 30 minutes outside and all of a sudden, everything feels less dark. 

The third thing is: You can’t trust everything you think about yourself all the time. There are many days that I don’t feel successful, that I don’t feel I’ve done enough. I haven’t grown my company fast enough, I want PULSE to be on a national stage so every parent can be thinking about these ideas. 

How you think about things and how you talk to yourself is so important. When I get in those moods, I decide: “I’m not going to trust myself today. It sounds like I’m a little off. I did enough today. If cleaning out the pantry or vacuuming is a different type of success today, I’ll do that. I’m not in the right mode.” That’s been really helpful. 

I love that! It’s Salesian too, being gentle with yourself. Looking back, what have you learned as an entrepreneur?

After I created complex care at Gilette Children’s, I thought: “Well, I have other ideas!” Then I realized I was up against certain realities of traditional healthcare, and I’d never be able to fully spread my wings in those creative capacities. I knew I would just have to do it myself. 

Reese Witherspoon talks about starting her media company “Hello, Sunshine” and that you don’t have to come out of the gate running. You have crawl, then walk, then run. 

Start by crawling. Just start. Don’t wait for success, go ahead and start without it. Don’t wait till you feel ready. No one feels ready! If you’re feeling a little uncomfortable or a little cringe-y—“Oh, I put that video out on social media!” or “I told someone I’m launching this!”—you’re moving in the right direction. 

I started with a small staff—start small and fail. “Oops! I wasn’t supposed to set up that contract that way!” Or you hire a direct-support professional, and it’s a bad hire. Or receiving negative feedback from a family. I feel like such a different person now in being able to weather the realities of the human condition. I really believe healthcare is human. I’ve learned so much about people, and I feel so much more powerful, having those understandings.  

How has your definition of success changed? 

The glamorous successes aren’t necessarily the pinnacle. They’re fleeting. You have to like the bread-and-butter of the work. It’s not the blue-ribbon moments that carry you through, it’s: Does it keep me excited? Does this fill my cup? 

Are you more deliberate about building in time for rest and leisure?

I’m more intentional now, only in the last couple of years. I’m more intentional about saying no to things—which boards I’m sitting on, what I’m getting involved in. I not only ask, “What can I bring to them?” but “How does that serve where I want to go?” That can clear the tray right there. 

What would you tell your 18-year-old self? 

Be patient with the process of becoming your most confident self.