When you meet Dr. John Rhyner, you’d never guess that the man revolutionizing heart care in Western North Carolina once managed a marina and flipped pancakes as a short-order cook. But it’s this patchwork of real-world experience that laid the foundation for one of the region’s most accomplished (and quietly trailblazing) electrophysiologists.

Now celebrating 10 years at Mission Hospital and more than two decades in the ever-evolving world of cardiac electrophysiology, Dr. John Rhyner blends science, precision, and compassion in a role that’s part detective, part healer. At its core, his job is to find and break the electrical short circuits in the heart that cause arrhythmias. But what we can do now is miles beyond what was possible even a decade ago.

John Rhyner was among the first in North Carolina to use pulse field ablation — a cutting-edge technique using electroporation rather than heat or cold to safely and precisely eliminate faulty heart tissue. Remarkably, he first encountered this technology years earlier, while studying HIV in mice at Mount Sinai before medical school.

His journey, which began at Northwestern University and wound through Duke, Mount Sinai, and the University of Michigan, was never linear. He didn’t know he loved procedural medicine until he tried it. But when he did, it clicked. This specialty lets him combine technical skill with research and human connection.

 

Despite the intensity of his work, Dr. Rhyner stays grounded. He credits his wife Chris and children as his reason for everything, his “raison d’être” and finds joy in gardening, reading, cooking, and climbing mountains, both figurative and literal. Next summer, he and his eldest son plan to summit Mount Fuji.

As a proud resident of Biltmore Park, he values the neighborhood’s walkability, sense of community, and proximity to the mountains that first drew him to Asheville. He came here from Chicago dreaming of long-range views and a stone fireplace. He didn’t get the view— but he got the fireplace and a great place to raise his family.

Whether in the lab, the operating room, or on the trail, John Rhyner continues to push the boundaries of what’s possible in modern medicine, quietly transforming lives, one heartbeat at a time.

The Rhyners live on Bent Oak Lane.