Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology Fellowship

Program Overview

The Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology Fellowship program at Houston Methodist is a one-year training program starting July 1st and concluding June 30th of each academic year. At the conclusion of training, fellows are eligible for certification in Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology by the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM). We currently have 3 ACGME-accredited fellowship positions each year. Our training meets or exceeds the standards set forth by United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) and the American Society of Transplantation (AST) guidelines.

Objectives of the Fellowship

Our fellowship program offers the entire breadth of clinical exposure from ICU, post-LVAD/transplant floors, cardiac catheterization lab, dedicated HF IMU and outpatient clinic setting. Specialized aspects of our clinical training, in addition to MCS/transplant, include pulmonary hypertension, cardiac amyloidosis, multi-organ transplant (heart-liver, heart-lung, and heart-kidney), cardio-oncology and HFpEF. Our program is unique in a sense that fellows rotating through the cardiac catheterization lab receive hands-on training in implantation of the CardioMEMS device and intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP) placement via a novel approach utilizing axillary artery access. This is in addition to the ample amount of exposure provided in performing endomyocardial biopsies, coronary angiography and invasive hemodynamic studies including exercise right heart catheterizations, constriction-restriction studies and LVAD speed optimization studies using concomitant RHC and TTE.

We also have primary focus on fellow education with incorporation of a formal didactic series dedicated to advanced heart failure and transplant cardiology that is imparted throughout the academic year. All advanced heart failure fellows participate in at least one original research project pertaining to their interest and are an integral part of our ongoing research efforts including our prominent involvement in ongoing national clinical trials in heart failure. Currently, we consistently perform over 100 interventions for end stage HF including, on average, approximately 65 LVADs and 45 heart and/ or heart multi-organ transplants per year.

In summary, we prepare fellows for an academic career in advanced heart failure and transplant cardiology who we hope will eventually be future leaders in the field of heart failure.