Departmental Highlights Archive
2008–2007
Division of Thoracic Surgery Welcomes Shrager, Merritt, and Hoang
Stanford’s Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery welcomes Drs. Joseph Shrager, Robert Merritt, and Chuong Hoang to the Division of Thoracic Surgery.
December 2008
Sonja Schrepfer, MD, PhD, Selected as Vivien Thomas Young Investigators Award Finalist
Sonja Schrepfer, MD, PhD, Clinical Instructor in the Cardiothoracic Transplantation Laboratory in the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, has been selected as a finalist for the award based on her research, entitled, "Cytokine enhancement with HGF or VEGF in the infarct border zone is key to attenuating the negative remodeling after myocardial infarction."
November 10, 2008
CT Surgery Welcomes Dr. Vincent DeFilippi and Teams Up with Salinas Valley Memorial to Create New Stanford Cardiac Surgery Program
Key to the Stanford Cardiac Surgery Program at Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital is the addition of Vincent DeFilippi, MD, as Medical Director of Cardiothoracic Surgery. Dr. DeFilippi has had an outstanding cardiovascular surgery career, performing over 3,000 open heart procedures and receiving numerous awards and recognition during his career, including being selected as a Top Doc in the state by New Jersey Monthly magazine and being listed among America’s Top Surgeons.
October 23, 2008
Observing the 40th Anniversary of the First Human Heart Transplantation in the United States
Four decades ago, years of research by Dr. Norman Shumway and his colleagues culminated in the first successful human heart transplantation in the United States. In the years since that momentous surgery, Dr. Shumway's team conducted clinical and basic research that have made heart and lung transplantations relatively common procedures, providing decades of life to patients worldwide.
October 6, 2008
Tom Nguyen, MD, Selected as Associate Editor of CTSNet Residents Section
Dr. Tom C. Nguyen, Stanford General Surgery Resident, has been selected as the Associate Editor of the Residents Section of CTSNet, the leading online resource of educational and scientific research information for cardiothoracic surgeons. In 2010, his position will be elevated to that of Editor when Nguyen begins his cardiothoracic surgery fellowship.
August 29, 2008
Schrepfer and Ransohoff Sisters Prove an Award-Winning Team in the Stanford CT Lab
When Bay Area natives Katie Ransohoff, 19, and her sister Julia Ransohoff, 17, realized that their far-reaching scientific aspirations were limited by the high school opportunities offered, they took it upon themselves to fill the gap by turning to Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital (LPCH) and the Cardiothoracic Transplantation Laboratory (CT Lab) at the Stanford School of Medicine to further their educational goals.
August 25, 2008
Denton Cooley, MD, Speaks at First Annual Shumway Lecture
Shumway and Cooley, along with heart surgeons Christian Barnard in South Africa and Micheal DeBakey at Baylor College of Medicine in Texas, became household names in 1967 and 1968, when, one after another, they performed the first human heart transplants. Now, the procedure has become almost routine, thanks to solutions developed by Shumway at Stanford Hospital, Cooley and others to overcome crucial obstacles in diagnosis, tissue rejection, and donor heart preservation. The pair — and other physicians they trained — continued to break lifesaving ground over the decades in transplant technique and heart repair.
June 20, 2008
Dake returning to Stanford to direct cardiac catheterization and angiography lab
Using every weapon available, from surgery to less-invasive treatments, is the key to winning the battle against heart and vascular disease, said Michael Dake, MD. A pioneer in the development of endovascular treatments for aortic pathologies, Dake will return to Stanford in July as professor of cardiothoracic surgery.
June 17, 2008
D. Craig Miller, MD, and Other Leaders Commit to Improve CT Surgery Education
The leaders of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) (led by 2007-2008 President D. Craig Miller, MD), American Board of Thoracic Surgery (ABTS), Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS), and Thoracic Surgery Foundation for Research and Education (TSFRE) are responding to this crisis by joining forces to create and fund a Joint Council on Thoracic Surgery Education (JCTSE) with the express purpose of changing the current training paradigm and coordinating all thoracic surgery education in the United States.
May 10, 2008
Miller philosophical, blunt, calls for systemic change
While AATS President D. Craig Miller left off the signature Stetson for Monday’s Presidential Address, he didn’t forget the bullets. In his presentation “Anti-Memoirs of Rocinante,” Dr. Miller focused his sights, and a good helping of free-market philosophy, on the current ills infecting the health care system in the US, advocating a single-payer system, an overhaul of the current educational system for cardiothoracic surgeons and a move towards regionalization.
May 10, 2008
D. Craig Miller, MD, and the AATS Promote Leadership and Reinvention: Highlights of the 88th Annual AATS Meeting
May 10th through 14th, the San Diego Convention Center will host the 88th Annual American Association of Thoracic Surgery (AATS) Meeting. Featured at the meeting is a compelling video highlighting the mission and goals of the AATS.
May 10, 2008
Tomasz Timek, MD, Receives AATS Resident Traveling Fellowship
Tomasz Timek, MD, Stanford Cardiothoracic Surgery Resident, has been selected to receive the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) Resident Traveling Fellowship for 2008-2009.
2008
Forty Years of Heart Transplants (Photos)
Norman E. Shumway, MD, PhD, performed the first successful human heart transplant in the United States in 1968 at Stanford. The recipient, 54-year-old steel worker Mike Kasperak, lived for 14 days. The landmark operation created a burst of enthusiasm for heart transplantation, though cardiac surgeons quickly lost interest because of the high rate of post-surgical deaths.
2008
Walter B. Cannon, MD: Soaring to New Heights, Literally
Members of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery at Stanford University Medical Center are no strangers to soaring to new heights, as their rich tradition of excellence and pioneering firsts make the department one of the top cardiothoracic programs in the nation. But one doctor in particular also reaches new heights outside the office, quite literally. In his free time, Walter B. Cannon, MD, clinical professor of thoracic surgery, heads for the glider field, assembles his German-built fiberglass glider, launches behind a towing airplane, and heads for the puffy cumulus clouds.
2008
A Change of Heart (Page 4 of the pdf)
Imagine a time when laboratories can grow healthy hearts for children in need of cardiac transplants. Or picture a future in which pediatricians treat severe skin diseases by graft ing genetically engineered skin cells onto the patient’s body. And what if doctors had the ability to prevent the formation of cleft palates and other birth defects while the baby is still in the womb.
Winter 2007
Bay Area Surgeons Will Try to Separate Conjoined Twins
Surgeons had feared that because the 2-year-old girls were attached at the heart and liver, separating them might prove very risky, or even fatal, for one or both girls. But splitting their shared liver was a smooth process, and both girls improved after their hearts were separated.
November 14, 2007
Kayla's story: An everyday miracle at Packard Children's (Page 6 of the pdf)
One-pound infant survives heart surgery. Doctors fix flaw in grape-sized heart. Baby awaiting transplant kept alive by mechanical heart.
Spring 2007
Stanford Team Repairs India's Smallest Hearts
Infant mortality in India is 54 per 1,000 live births, in contrast to 6 per 1,000 in the United States. About 10 percent of infant deaths are due to congenital heart disease, according to All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi.
February 8, 2007
Stanford Surgeon with a Big Heart
Rishit, a three-month-old infant, was born again when Dr V Mohan Reddy, a pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon, operated on his heart at the Asian Heart Institute, Bandra.
January 28, 2007
Dr. Robert Robbins Helps Boost Interest in Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine
On May 30, 2007, the Stanford University Medical Center hosted a program entitled "Harnessing the Power of Stem Cells: A New Medical Frontier" that was attended by over 200 members of the community. In addition to the keynote address by Dr. Irving Weissman, some of the most challenging and exciting areas of investigation were presented by a highly diversified and outstanding faculty group from across the university, including Robert Robbins, former professor and chair of Cardiothoracic Surgery and former director of the Stanford Cardiovascular Institute.
2007