Charles Watts, MD
Neurological Surgery · St Louis Park, MNNPI 1427001171
Payments from drug & device makers
What this record shows
The money is spread across several categories — consulting fees (45.3%), travel and lodging and food and beverage — rather than concentrated in one kind of arrangement. Medtronic accounts for 99.3% of it on its own, with 4 other manufacturers making up the rest. Reporting peaked in 2019 at $9,087 and has fallen 96.2% since, to $349 in 2025.
Across 141 payments — averaging $181.43 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Medtronic$25K
- Johnson & Johnson$97
- Centinel Spine, LLC$30
- CSL Behring$20
- GT Medical Technologies, Inc$20
Across 4 payments — averaging $7089.50 each. Payments tied to a research study. These frequently flow through the physician to a hospital or research institution rather than to the physician personally.
- Medtronic$28K
What the payments were for
- Consulting fees$11,60045%
- Speaking & faculty fees$3,30013%
- Travel & lodging$6,10224%
- Food & beverage$4,55818%
- Education$200%
General payments by program year
Who reported the general payments
Companies are grouped under their corporate parent — a single manufacturer often files under several CMS reporting entities. Research and ownership payments are counted separately and are not in this table.
| Company | Payments | Total |
|---|---|---|
| Medtronic(2 entities) | 136 | $25,415 |
| Johnson & Johnson | 2 | $97 |
| Centinel Spine, LLC | 1 | $30 |
| CSL Behring | 1 | $20 |
| GT Medical Technologies, Inc | 1 | $20 |
What the payments were tied to
Products named in the reported payments. Only payments of $100 or more are attributed here — the typical reported payment nationally is a meal worth about $16, and listing those product-by-product would be noise.
- KYPHON EXPRESS II KYPHOPAK TRAY$3,300
- CD HORIZON$2,987
- PRESTIGE$2,320
- ATLANTIS$2,320
- CD HORIZON SPINAL SYSTEM$1,747
- SYNCHROMEDII$339
- UNID_PASS$290
- ELEVATE$203
- OSTEOCOOL RF ABLATION$170
- Mazor X Stealth Edition$105
How this compares
$25,581 in reported general payments places this provider in the 85th percentile of 140 neurological surgery providers in Minnesota.
Medicare billing
What this is not: this is the amount Original Medicare Part B allowed for services this provider billed in 2024. It is not their income. It excludes Medicare Advantage — now more than half of all Medicare enrollment — along with Medicaid and all commercial insurance, and it is gross practice revenue before staff, rent, supplies and malpractice premiums. CMS also suppresses any figure covering ten or fewer patients, so low-volume providers appear smaller than they are.
Most prescribed under Part D
| Drug | Claims | Cost to plans & patients |
|---|---|---|
| Gabapentin | 14 | $365 |
| Mupirocin | 17 | $121 |
Paid to pharmacies, not to this prescriber.
Other neurological surgery in St Louis Park
- Navid KhezriSt Louis Park$12K
- Sandeep TejaSt Louis Park$4K
- Kendall LeeRochester$2.3M
- Michael FinnEdina$1.4M
- Stanley SkinnerMinneapolis$445K
- Rohan LallEdina$227K
- Matthew DaviesDuluth$163K
- Vijay AgarwalRochester$101K
- Frederick HarrisBurnsville$92K
- Andrew GrandeSaint Paul$88K
Where these figures come from
- Payments: CMS Open Payments, program years 2019–2025 (publication P06302026_06032026).
- Billing: Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners, data year 2024. Original Medicare Part B only.
- Identity: NPPES NPI Registry, July 2026.