Interventional Cardiology Fellowship
This program prepares you for a career in interventional cardiology in academic and clinical settings.
Overview from the Program Director
The interventional cardiology fellowship at the University of Kansas Medical Center is a one-year program designed to prepare the trainee for a career in academic as well as clinical interventional cardiology. The program is ACGME accredited and fulfills all ACGME mandated requirements for training. This is the only accredited interventional cardiology training program in the state of Kansas.
The fellowship is entirely based at the University of Kansas Hospital, which is the primary teaching hospital for the University. This is a 456-bed academic tertiary care referral center for the Kansas City metropolitan area and gets patients from a tri-state region. The Center for Advance Cardiac Care is housed within the KU hospital and is a state-of-the-art facility that provides an ideal environment for interventional training. The center houses five modern and fully equipped cardiac catheterization laboratories (two of these are state-of-the-art hybrid suites with open heart capabilities). The catheterization laboratories have fully integrated invasive diagnostic modalities such as intravascular ultrasound and optical coherence tomography. The annual volume for interventional cardiology services is approximately 800 coronary interventions, over 300 vascular procedures and over 300 structural heart cases. KU is also a center of excellence for training for fractional flow reserve and optical coherence tomography and thus we gave a large volume of cases in these procedures also. The program offers exposure to a wide variety of procedures including most currently available investigational devices. The structural program performs most available procedures including about 200 transcatheter aortic valve procedures and other procedures such as mitral clip, left atrial occlusions, PFO/ ASD/ VSD closures and a variety of valvuloplasties including pulmonary valve procedures. Our coronary case mix also allows for training in advance techniques. Due to a busy valve program we have a high volume of multi-vessel coronary interventions in the elderly populations resulting in frequent use of various coronary atherectomy devices and of percutaneous cardiac assist devices. Thus, even though the ACGME-accredited fellowship is geared towards providing an exceptional coronary training (all past fellows have graduated with over 350 coronary interventions) all fellows also get a good exposure to non-coronary procedures (average number of peripheral cases performed during fellowship is 150 cases). Since we choose to accept only one interventional fellow each year, the training opportunities abound without competition for cases amongst trainees. Fellows are free to choose the cases they scrub into.
The core-teaching faculty comprises of six full-time board-certified interventional cardiologists who are dedicated to the training of our fellows. Each faculty is a high volume coronary interventionalist but also has a specific area of expertise such as peripheral or structural. Thus our fellows learn from very experienced faculty. The daily work environment is very friendly and is geared towards the optimization of workflow and learning. This is possible due to a large number of very experienced mid-level staff in our team that helps facilitate smooth workflow.
The interventional service is involved in a large number of research studies including device studies that allows for our trainees to be exposed to new and emerging technologies. The Cardiovascular Research Institute offers state-of-the-art facilities and infrastructure for basic, clinical, or translational cardiovascular research. A number of physicians within the division are actively engaged in numerous investigator-initiated projects also. Fellows are strongly encouraged to initiate and participate in innovative projects, present at conferences, and publish.
There are a variety of educational opportunities by way of didactic and other conferences. Conferences are held at 7 a.m., on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. The Internal Medicine grand rounds are held on Wednesday mornings at 8 a.m. Interventional fellows lead the Interventional Journal Club once month and also lead a hemodynamics conference. There is a separate noninvasive imaging conference at noon on Thursday and research conferences every third Wednesday of the month at 7 a.m.
Thus, in summary the Interventional Cardiology Training program at the University of Kansas Medical Center provides a high-quality interventional training in a very supportive academic environment with exposure to a wide variety of cases in all sub-areas of our specialty. Our first time board pass rate is 100% and all are graduates have been immensely successful in their chosen careers.
Kamal Gupta, M.D.
Program Director
Prasad Gunasekaran, MBBS
Associate Program Director
How to Apply
Applications are accepted in the Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) beginning July 1. To be considered for review, your application must be complete in ERAS by August 5. A complete application means the following documents are released to our program: a recent CV, personal statement, at least three letters of recommendation, USMLE transcripts, a photo, and ECFMG certificate (international graduates).
Current Fellows
Mohinder Vindhyal, M.D.
Interventional Cardiology Fellow
CV Fellowship: University of Kansas Medical Center
Residency: University of Kansas - Wichita
Medical School: S.V.S. Medical College