Invited Speakers

International 4 Corners of Cardiology Meeting 2022

The 4 Corners of Cardiology Meeting Organising Committee would like introduce the following invited speakers as part of the 2022 program. Our international speakers will not be attending in person, however, their presentations will be streamed virtually to attendees. 

Arrhythmias

International Speaker

Dr Sana Al-Khatib

Dr Sana Al-Khatib
Professor of Medicine at Duke University Medical Center

Dr. Sana M. Al-Khatib is a tenured Professor of Medicine at Duke University Medical Center, a board-certified clinical electrophysiologist and an experienced clinical researcher in cardiac arrhythmias.  As a graduate of the NIH-funded Clinical Research Training Program, she is one of a few electrophysiologists nationwide with expertise in quantitative research methods. Her clinical expertise is in sudden cardiac death prevention, atrial fibrillation and ventricular arrhythmias, and implantable cardiac devices.  Dr. Al-Khatib serves on multiple national committees including the Heart Rhythm Society Board of Trustees, the Heart Rhythm Society Health Policy committee, the Heart Rhythm Society Legislative subcommittee, the Heart Rhythm Society Program Planning committee, the American College of Cardiology ICD Registry Steering committee, and the National Quality Forum Cardiovascular Steering committee.

 

National Speakers

Prof Ben Freedman

Professor Ben Freedman OAM
Deputy Director of Cardiovascular Research at Sydney’s Heart Research Institute, and Honorary Professor of Cardiology at the Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney

Ben Freedman is Deputy Director Cardiovascular Research at Sydney’s Heart Research Institute, Honorary Professor of Cardiology at the Charles Perkins Centre, University of Sydney, and former head of Department of Cardiology Concord Hospital. He is also Adjunct Professor at Monash University, Honorary Professorial Fellow University of Melbourne and Visiting Professor and Lui Che Woo Distinguished Professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.   He was Deputy Dean of Medicine at the University of Sydney between 2003-12. His major research interest is stroke prevention in atrial fibrillation. In 2015 he formed the AF-SCREEN International Collaboration with 5 others. It now has 180 members from 36 countries. He co-chaired the 2020 World Heart Federation’s AF-Roadmap update. In 2002 he was scientific chairman of the successful World Congress of Cardiology. In 2011 he was awarded the Order of Australia Medal for service to medicine as a clinician, educator and researcher.

Prof Peter Kistler

Professor Peter Kistler
Head of electrophysiology at the Alfred Hospital and Head of Clinical Electrophysiology research at the Baker Heart Institute in Melbourne

Professor Peter Kistler is a clinician cardiologist and electrophysiologist and an international leader in the treatment of heart rhythm disorders. He is the Head of electrophysiology at the Alfred Hospital and Head of Clinical Electrophysiology research at the Baker Heart Institute in Melbourne. He is a Professor in the department of Medicine at the University of Melbourne and Monash Universities. Peter has made a substantial contribution to the field of atrial arrhythmias with 210 publications, 6467 citations and has supervised 15 PhD students. He was the senior author of the first randomized study defining the role of alcohol abstinence in atrial fibrillation published in NEJM in 2020. Peter was awarded the prestigious RT Hall Prize from CSANZ in 2020 for excellence in cardiac research. He is an invited speaker at the American Heart Association, Heart Rhythm Society (USA) and Asia-Pacific Heart Rhythm Society. He is the current Chair of the Cardiac Society Australia New Zealand AF ablation guidelines and was a member of the National Heart Foundation Heart Failure Guidelines 2018.

Prof Alistair Royse

Professor Alistair Royse
Cardiothoracic Surgeon at the University of Melbourne and Royal Melbourne Hospital

Alistair is a cardiothoracic surgeon at the University of Melbourne and the Royal Melbourne Hospital and has an interesting arterial coronary surgery, pacing and clinical ultrasound. He was the Australian principal investigator for the LAAOS-III trial which randomised patients to receive surgical occlusion of the left atrial appendage has a concomitant procedure during other cardiac surgical operations.

At the University of Melbourne he maintains an active research program, and has more than 230 peer-reviewed publications. He is also the director of e-learning technologies and ultrasound education groups for the Melbourne Medical School, and has created a large online education platform which has delivered 19,000 courses in 2020.

Prof Prashanthan Sanders

Professor Prash Sanders
Director of the Centre for Heart Rhythm Disorders at the University of Adelaide, and Director of Cardiac Electrophysiology and Pacing at the Royal Adelaide Hospital

Professor Sanders is a clinical academic based at the University of Adelaide, Royal Adelaide Hospital and the South Australian Health and Medical Research Insititute. He is the Director of the Centre for Heart Rhythm Disorders at the University of Adelaide; Director of Cardiac Electrophysiology and Pacing at the Royal Adelaide Hospital; and the Group Leader for Heart Rhythm Disorders at SAHMRI.
Professor Sanders holds the Knapman – NHF Chair of Cardiology Research and is supported by a Practitioner Fellowship from the NHMRC.

Heart Failure

International Speakers

Prof Frank Ruschitzka

Professor Frank Ruschitzka
Chairman of the Department of Cardiology at the University Hospital in Zürich

Prof Ruschitzka is Chairman of the Department of Cardiology at the University Hospital in Zürich, Switzerland. Professor Ruschitzka received his medical degree from the University of Göttingen in Germany in 1989. He is specialized in internal medicine, nephrology and cardiology at the Universities of Göttingen and Zürich. In 2001, he received the Cardiovascular Science Award of the Swiss Society of Cardiology as well as the Annual Award of the Swiss Society of Hypertension. In 2003, he was awarded the annual Götz-Preis of the Medical Faculty of the University of Zürich for excellence in clinical medicine and research.

In respect of Henry Krum and the 4CCardiology biennial event, Frank will also host the Krum Memorial Lecture.

Prof Lynne Stevenson

Professor Lynne Stevenson
Professor of Medicine and Director of Cardiomyopathy Program at Vanderbilt University

Lynne Warner Stevenson has been Director of Cardiomyopathy at UCLA, Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, and currently Vanderbilt University. She has contributed to over 30 guidelines for HF, transplantation, rhythm devices, and advanced decision-making. She has served on the FDA and as associate editor for Circulation, Circulation HF and JACC. She has played leadership roles in NHLBI trials ESCAPE,  REMATCH and the HF Network, and as a designer of NCDR ICD and NHLBI INTERMACS registries. Her physiologic research has focused on HF profiles to take the congestion out of HF, patient-centered outcomes and decision-making. Her newest interest is learning how genetic variants influence trajectories of cardiomyopathy. She co-chaired the recent ACC Pathway for HF hospitalization and was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by Heart Failure Society of America in 2021. Strong commitments for her remain training to sustain the patient-clinician connection, re-defining HF without congestion, and seeking clarity to personalize care for quality and length of life.

National Speakers

Prof Chris Hayward

Professor Chris Hayward
Director of the Mechanical and Circulatory Support research program at St Vincent’s Private Hospital

Professor Hayward is a senior staff Cardiologist with the Heart and Lung Transplant Unit at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney, and on Faculty at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute. He has academic appointments at the University of New South Wales, Sydney and the University of Technology, Sydney and is a Life Member of the National Heart Foundation of Australia.  He is internationally recognised in management of patients with mechanical circulatory devices – ‘artificial hearts’ with other areas of interest including the management of patients with severe advanced heart failure. He has served as Vice President for the National Heart Foundation (NSW Division) Board, and on the Human Research and Ethics Committee for the St Vincent’s and Mater Health Service.

Prof David Kaye

Professor David Kaye
Head of the Heart Failure Research group at Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute

Professor David Kaye, a cardiologist specialising in heart failure and transplantation, is an NHMRC Senior Principal Research Fellow. He is Director of the Department of Cardiology at The Alfred Hospital, and Head of the Heart Failure Research group at the Baker Institute.

Professor Kaye’s research examines the pathophysiology of heart failure, with a particular emphasis on identifying novel mechanisms that can be targeted for therapeutic intervention. Professor Kaye is an Adjunct Professor at Monash University with over 420 peer reviewed publications in top tier journals. Professor Kaye has been highly successful in the generation of intellectual property leading to commercial and clinical outcomes, this has resulted in his appointment as Chair of the medical advisory boards for Osprey Medical and Cardiora Pty Ltd.

Acute Coronary Syndrome (ACS)

International Speaker

Dr Deepak Bhatt

Dr Deepak L. Bhatt
Executive Director of Interventional Cardiovascular Programs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Deepak L. Bhatt MD, MPH, is Executive Director of Interventional Cardiovascular Programs at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Bhatt has over 1600 publications and has been listed by the Web of Science as a Highly Cited Researcher. He is the Editor of the peer-reviewed Journal of Invasive Cardiology and Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Heart Letter for patients. He received the Eugene Braunwald Teaching Award for Excellence in the Teaching of Clinical Cardiology from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in 2017, ACC’s Distinguished Mentor Award in 2018, and AHA’s Distinguished Scientist Award in 2019.

National Speakers

Prof Derek Chew

Professor Derek Chew
Regional Head of Cardiology for the Adelaide Health Service (Southern Region), Head of the Flinders Clinical Trial Centre, and Chair of the Statewide Cardiology Clinical Network

Derek Chew is a clinical and interventional cardiologist as well as a clinical trialist and outcomes researcher in cardiovascular medicine. He has completed a Masters of Public Health at the Harvard School of Public Health in quantitative methods. He is a Senior Principal Research Fellow in Cardiovascular Outcomes Research, and is the Regional Head of Cardiology for the Adelaide Health Service (Southern Region). Derek is the Head of the Flinders Clinical Trial Centre, and Chair of the Statewide Cardiology Clinical Network. His clinical and research career is centred on the translation of current and future therapies and technologies in cardiology to improved patient outcomes in a clinically effective manner.

Prof Jason Kovacic

Professor Jason Kovacic
Chief Executive Director of the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute

Jason Kovacic graduated from The University of Melbourne Medical School in 1994, and then undertook residency and cardiology specialty training at St. Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney. Jason then completed a PhD at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, before relocating to the USA, to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. At the NIH, Jason undertook a 2 year postdoctoral fellowship with the then Director of the NHLBI, Dr. Elizabeth Nabel. In 2009 Jason moved to Mount Sinai in New York. As a physician-scientist and investigator at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Jason established a cardiovascular research laboratory with a strong interest in the cellular, molecular and genetic mechanisms underlying cardiovascular disease. He also established a large clinical practice as an interventional and clinical cardiologist. Major career achievements include successful investigator-initiated clinical studies of cardiovascular progenitor cell therapy, molecular characterization of a novel vascular progenitor cell population, unravelling the pathobiology of fibromuscular dysplasia and spontaneous coronary artery dissection, numerous basic and translational studies on the biology and manifestations of atherosclerosis, and pioneering studies regarding the role of endothelial to mesenchymal transition (EndMT) in adult vascular biology and disease.

 

In early 2020 Jason was recruited to return Australia, and to take on the role of the Executive Director of the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute. In this role, he leads one of the world’s leading Cardiovascular Research Institutes. Jason has now established his research program at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, where he continues his focus on cardiac and vascular diseases, including fibromuscular dysplasia and spontaneous coronary artery dissection. Jason currently holds the positions of the Robert M. Graham Chair and Professor of Cardiovascular Research at University of New South Wales, and continues his appointment as Professor of Medicine (Cardiology) at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, USA.

 

Dr Sidney Lo

Dr Sidney Lo
Clinical lead of the TAVI program at Liverpool Hospital

Recognised internationally as CTO-PCI expert and published papers on CTO-PCI. Director of the Asia Pacific CTO club, Dr Sidney Lo is currently elected NSW representative and secretary of interventional council of Cardiac society of Australia and New Zealand and member of the organising committee of the ANZET meeting annually. Appointed in 2018 as Associate Director of AICT-Asia PCR, he has served as Faculty at TCT, EuroPCr, CIT, summer-In-Seattle, CCT, TTT, Topic, ANZET, CSANZ, HK cardiac society, Taiwan cardiac society. Organising committee on Heart failure meetings 2003-2005. Highly experienced in PTMV, BAV, ASD/PFO closure procedures and clinical lead of the TAVI programme at Liverpool Hospital. He has started a distal radial access programme at Liverpool Hospital Sept 2018.  He has performed multiple live case demonstrations in high risk, complex PCI as well as CTO-PCI at local and international meetings.

Dr Dale Murdoch

Dr Dale Murdoch
Senior Staff Specialist at The Prince Charles Hospital

Dr Dale Murdoch BSc MBBS FRACP FCSANZ is a general and interventional cardiologist in Brisbane, Australia, with special interests in structural heart disease intervention, transcatheter heart valves and transformative technology in healthcare.

Dr Murdoch completed fellowships in interventional cardiology at The Prince Charles Hospital, Brisbane, Australia and St Paul’s Hospital, Vancouver Canada. Currently, he is focussed on clinical practice, research and education and performs a broad range of complex cardiac interventions including coronary stenting, mechanical circulatory support, TAVI, transcatheter mitral valve repair and replacement and PFO/ASD closure. He has authored 3 book chapters and over 40 peer-reviewed articles, and regularly presents at national and international scientific meetings.

Dr Murdoch is a senior staff specialist at The Prince Charles Hospital in Brisbane, Australia, visits St Vincent’s Private Hospital Northside and is a Senior Lecturer in Medicine at The University of Queensland.

A/Prof Sarah Zaman

Associate Professor Sarah Zaman
Academic Interventional Cardiologist at Westmead Hospital, Westmead Applied Research Centre, and University of Sydney

Associate Professor Sarah Zaman is an Academic Interventional Cardiologist at Westmead Hospital and the Westmead Applied Research Centre, University of Sydney, Australia. A/Prof Zaman has been recognized as a national leader in academic cardiology as recipient of the prestigious National Heart Foundation Future Leader Fellowship and NSW Elite Post-doctoral Grant. She has also been recognized internationally within interventional cardiology; having been selected world-wide to the United States, SCAI-ELM Fellowship. A/Prof Zaman has a PhD from the University of Sydney, targeting prevention of sudden cardiac death. She leads a Women’s Heart Disease Research Program at the University of Sydney and has more than $2 million in competitive grant funding. She is regularly invited faculty to national and international interventional scientific meetings and organizes the Australian/New Zealand Endovascular Therapies scientific sessions. A/Prof Sarah Zaman is an active advocate for women in cardiology, having co-founded the Women in Cardiology groups for Australia/New Zealand.

Risk Factors and Prevention

International Speakers

Prof Børge Nordestgaard

Professor Børge G. Nordestgaard, MD, DMSc
UProfessor of Genetic Epidemiology at the University of Copenhagen, Chief physician of Clinical Biochemistry at Herlev Hospital and Copenhagen University Hospital, Copenhagen Denmark

In 1985 he graduated as a medical doctor from University of Copenhagen. Scientific education included 2 years at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and 2 years St. Thomas’s Hospital in London, UK. Prof. Nordestgaard has for more than 35 years continued his interest in the pathogenesis, diagnosis and treatment of hyperlipidemia, atherosclerosis, diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and has written extensively on these conditions. He is chairing the Copenhagen General Population Study and is also a steering committee member of the Copenhagen City Heart Study and of 4 large randomised intervention trials. Prof. Børge G. Nordestgaard has supervised 65 Ph.D. students and 31 postdoctoral fellows, and has published 818 original articles and 125 reviews, book chapters, consensus statements, & editorials. His H-index is 130 in Web of Science and he is listed among the 6389 researchers World-wide with the most highly cited papers.

Prof David Wood

Professor David Allan Wood
Emeritus Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine at the Imperial College, London UK

Professor Wood is a cardiologist committed to prevention of cardiovascular disease and holds joint emeritus academic appointments at Imperial College and the National University of Ireland-Galway. He has contributed to international policy and guidelines on cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention
through the World Health Organisation, World Heart Federation and the European Society of Cardiology. He was a founder and President of the European Association for Cardiovascular Prevention
and Rehabilitation, a Board member of the European Society of Cardiology and most recently President of the World Heart Federation (2017-18).

National Speakers

Prof Robyn Clark

Professor Robyn Clark
Professor Acute Care and Cardiovascular Research at Flinders University

Prof Robyn Clark is a is a registered nurse who and has been a full-time researcher for 17 years. She is a former midwife, Critical Care RN, with a MEd, and has a PhD in Health Sciences. As a clinical nurse Prof Clark is in the top 1% of nurses who have received continuous research career funding from the Heart Foundation and NHMRC and SA Health recently completing a Heart Foundation Future Leaders Fellowship. Prof Clark has earned international recognition for her research into the most effective CVD management of Australia’s most disadvantaged populations (elderly, rural and remote, low literacy, English as a second language and Aboriginal and Torres Stait Islander people.  Prof Clark utilises her clinical skills to lead the translation knowledge in all aspects of her research program ensuring that the research evidence is implemented into practice, is patient centred and adapted into policy to achieve sustained models to improve access to CVD services.

Prof Gemma A. Figtree

Professor Gemma A. Figtree, MB BS, DPhil (Oxon), FRACP, FCSANZ, FAHA
Professor in Medicine at the University of Sydney

Gemma Figtree is a Professor in Medicine at the University of Sydney. She co-leads the Cardiovascular Theme for Sydney Health Partners, a NHMRC Advanced Health Research and Translation Centre and is the Chair of the University of Sydney’s multi-disciplinary Cardiovascular Initiative. Gemma completed her DPhil at Oxford University in 2002 supported by a Rhodes Scholarship making fundamental discoveries regarding estrogen’s actions and factors regulating NO/redox balance in the cardiovascular system. Her research and clinical perspective and leadership are recognised by her membership of the Scientific Board of Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand (responsible for International Relations), and her appointment to the Expert Advisory Panel for NHMRC Structural Review of Grants Program (2016-17), and as well as the Clinical Committee of the Heart Foundation.

Prof Stephen Nicholls

Professor Stephen Nicholls
Director of MonashHeart, Director of Victorian Heart Institute and Professor of Cardiology at Monash University

Steve Nicholls is the Director of MonashHeart, Director of Victorian Heart Institute and Professor of Cardiology at Monash University. He will be the Director of the Victorian Heart Hospital. He completed his cardiology training at John Hunter Hospital and PhD at the University of Adelaide, prior to holding a postdoctoral fellowship and faculty appointment at the Cleveland Clinic and the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute. His research interests focus on the role of metabolic risk factors and imaging in atherosclerosis, with work spanning from early discovery to leadership of large clinical trials. He is Chair of the Australian Atherosclerosis Society Clinical Council, Australia and New Zealand Alliance for Cardiovascular Trials, Asia Pacific Cardiometabolic Consortium, Secretary of the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences.

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