Personal Profile
I returned to Chennai and worked as a Registrar for a year in a major cardiothoracic unit before commencing his employment in the UK in 1996 as a Registrar in Medicine/Cardiology at Hairmyres Hospital, East Kilbride, Glasgow. Hairmyres Hospital was the first hospital in the UK to commence a Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) program without onsite cardiac surgery. This was followed by a very successful period of coronary interventional research under Professor Keith Oldroyd which culminated in multiple peer reviewed publications and in 2002, I was one of the recipients of the Young Investigators Award at the European Society of Cardiology in Berlin.
In August 2002, I successfully entered the Specialist Training program in Cardiology at Bristol. I spent 5 years in Bristol sub-specialising in coronary intervention and complex device therapy. In 2007, I was appointed as Consultant Cardiologist in the new cardiology department based at Royal Blackburn Hospital, Blackburn. Over the last 13 years, my colleagues and I have transformed the face of cardiology in East Lancashire which can now proudly claim to possess one of the best performing cardiology units in the country. This unit is now one of the largest non-surgical PCI centre in the North of England with around 700 PCIs performed yearly since 2014. It is also amongst the largest trans-radial centres by percentage in the country with 97% of PCIs performed via the trans-radial route. I lead the pacing service and was instrumental in developing a local biventricular pacing as well as the implantable defibrillator service. I have continued to maintain my research interest in coronary artery disease, developed close links with the academic unit in Glasgow and have published in multiple international peer reviewed journals. I have more than 30 peer reviewed publications and my Research Gate (RG) score of 33.31 is amongst the top 10% of clinicians and academicians in Medicine.
I was appointed as the first Clinical Director for Cardiology in April 2012 and continue to lead the department. My work has been recognised by the following appointments
- Honorary Clinical Reader, University of Central Lancashire
- Honorary Senior Lecturer, University of Glasgow
- Honorary Lecturer, University of Lancaster
I have a wide range of expertise in Cardiology which includes
- Clinical cardiology
- Invasive and interventional cardiology (Percutaneous Coronary Intervention)
- Cardiac rhythm management, including pacemakers and complex device therapy (biventricular pacemakers and implantable defibrillators)
- Transthoracic echocardiography
- Coronary artery disease
- Systemic hypertension
- Cardio-oncology. I am the only cardiologist in the East Lancashire region who has completed the Cardio-Oncology certification course provided by the European Cardio-Oncology Symposium (ECOS)
I have enormous experience and have been performing various cardiac interventional procedures for 2 decades including more than 5000 cardiac catheterisation procedures, more than 2000 angioplasty procedures and more than 1000 pacemaker implants including complex device therapy. The outcomes from the various interventional procedures (Percutaneous Coronary Intervention, Pacemaker Implantation, Complex Device Therapy) I perform is outstanding with low or minimal complication rates. For instance, my 30-day mortality related to angioplasty (Percutaneous Coronary Intervention) procedures is 0.3% which is superior to the national or predicted average of 1.03%.
I have excellent multi-source feedback from patients and colleagues. The average score of feedback from patients is 4.98 (out of 5) and 4.83 (out of 5) from colleagues. These scores are exceptional and above average. In particular, my patients and colleagues give full marks (5 out of 5) for clinical knowledge, doing the best for patients and for being a polite clinician.
