Shamir Course for Complex Coronary Interventions

Dr. Ilya Litovchik is a senior interventional cardiologist at Shamir Medical Center, Israel. He graduated from the medical school of Lviv, Ukraine in 1994. After completing his residency in internal medicine and cardiology in Israel, Dr. Litovchik became the IDF's chief cardiologist. Following his military service, he continued to specialize in interventional cardiology. In addition to his training in Israel, Dr. Litovchik attended fellowship programs in Italy and Japan. He has performed thousands of coronary and structural procedures at Shamir Medical Center. Since 2018, he turned to the CTO field which was still underdeveloped in Israel. As part of his work, he initiated the Israeli National CTO Registry. Today, Dr. Litovchik coordinates and leads the CTO activity in Israel and participates and presents at international conferences in Israel and abroad. He also conducts practical workshops and proctoring programs in a variety of fields related to coronary interventions, such as coronary physiology and imaging as well as structural intervention.

Dr Kambis Mashayekhi is Head of the Department of Internal Medicine and Cardiology in Heart Center Lahr in Germany. Dr. Mashayekhi is performing over 350 CTO-PCI’s per year and is an world-renowned CTO and complex PCI specialist. Dr. Mashayekhi is the head of the CTO working group from the German Society of cardiology and the Co-Director of MLCTO and EuroCTO course. He is the new EuroCTO president elect for 2023.

Prof Sunao Nakamura is one of the most experienced interventional cardiologist Japan. He have performed more than 25,000 cases of PCI and 10,000 cases of chronic total occlusion (CTO) in his career which is the biggest number in the world. He has a very unique background as a researcher; studying basic molecular science (molecular cell biology) and clinical science in university more than 10 years in his younger days. Then, the encounter with Prof. Shigeru Saito, who is a great leader of interventional cardiologist in Japan made Prof. Nakamura suddenly shift his main field of cardiology to Interventional cardiology due to respect of great works of Prof. Shigeru Saito. After accumulating big number of the PCI cases, following the Prof. Saito’s words, Dr. Nakamura had started to share his experience of PCI in Asian countries from early 30‘s of his age spending half a year in foreign countries. As a result of through these activities over the years, he has built incredibly great relations with many doctors through the experience of PCI cases and many discussions. His motto is that all the patients around the world should be properly saved, so he had generously taught every kind of PCI technique, skill and knowledge to many doctors. He is also fully engaged in the leading edge of clinical activities and researches for many years. During this period, many clinical and basic studies were conducted, keeping the pace of 30 papers published per year. Especially in close relation with Professor Antonio Colombo, Italy, Professor IK Jan, USA, there are many collaborated clinical studies with them. His dream is to make the world's leading heart center where medical research from basic to clinical is conducted collecting Crème de la Crème Doctors in the world.

Prof Sunao Nakamura is one of the most experienced interventional cardiologist Japan. He have performed more than 25,000 cases of PCI and 10,000 cases of chronic total occlusion (CTO) in his career which is the biggest number in the world. He has a very unique background as a researcher; studying basic molecular science (molecular cell biology) and clinical science in university more than 10 years in his younger days. Then, the encounter with Prof. Shigeru Saito, who is a great leader of interventional cardiologist in Japan made Prof. Nakamura suddenly shift his main field of cardiology to Interventional cardiology due to respect of great works of Prof. Shigeru Saito. After accumulating big number of the PCI cases, following the Prof. Saito’s words, Dr. Nakamura had started to share his experience of PCI in Asian countries from early 30‘s of his age spending half a year in foreign countries. As a result of through these activities over the years, he has built incredibly great relations with many doctors through the experience of PCI cases and many discussions. His motto is that all the patients around the world should be properly saved, so he had generously taught every kind of PCI technique, skill and knowledge to many doctors. He is also fully engaged in the leading edge of clinical activities and researches for many years. During this period, many clinical and basic studies were conducted, keeping the pace of 30 papers published per year. Especially in close relation with Professor Antonio Colombo, Italy, Professor IK Jan, USA, there are many collaborated clinical studies with them. His dream is to make the world's leading heart center where medical research from basic to clinical is conducted collecting Crème de la Crème Doctors in the world.

Prof Andrew Sharp qualified from Edinburgh Medical School in 1998 and is Professor of Cardiology at the University Hospital of Wales and Cardiff University in the U.K. He conducted his early training at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, before moving to London for his senior clinical training. He completed the prestigious Milan-Imperial Interventional Cardiology Fellowship programme, having spent a year in San Raffaele and Columbus Hospitals, Milan, Italy, under the tutelage of Professor Antonio Colombo. He also spent three years training in interventional cardiology at Imperial College Hospitals in London. Prof Sharp was awarded an MD postgraduate research degree from the University of Edinburgh for his work on the hypertensive heart and his research interests include intracoronary imaging and physiology. as well as the use of device-based treatments for hypertension and pulmonary embolism.

Dr Justin Davies is a honorary 
interventional cardiologist at Hammersmith Hospital, Imperial College NHS Trust, London. After training at Imperial College, he won a prestigious BHF research fellowship to study arterial haemodynamics. Since then he has continued to
work on the development of mathematical algorithms to aid understanding of large artery physiology and to develop new tools to assess arterial disease. The holder of several patents,
he has published widely in the field of hypertension, coronary and large artery physiology and is the winner of many national and international awards. He has several international collaborations, and is the developer of iFR and the co-principal investigator of the ADVISE studies, the DEFINE-FLAIR, ORBITA and DEFINE-PCI studies. Justin also has an interest in renal denervation, and has lead the first-in-man studies to evaluate the safety of this technique to patients with chronic systolic heart failure (REACH studies).

A consultant cardiologist at VU University Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Features in 4 videos on Wondr Medical. Paul Knaapen generally speaks on Chronic Total Occlusion (CTO), Stable Coronary Artery Disease (CAD), CT Coronary Angiography, and Coronary Interventions.

Dr Roberto Garbo is the Director of the CTO PCI, CHIP, and complex PCI program in Maria Pia Hospital GVM Care & Research, Turin, Italy. He was Head of the Cath Lab at San Giovanni Bosco Hospital from 2005-2020. He is the Director of the International Turin CTO & CHIP Live Congress. He has been Board member of EuroCTO Club from 2017 to 2023. Dr Garbo is one of the greatest experts in the world in the field of IVUS guided CTO in both antegrade and retrograde approach, with more than 2400 CTO of which more than 1100 retrograde CTO PCI. He performed as Live first operator more than 100 CTO PCI live cases during international CTO Congress . He is a Proctor for CTO PCI programs in Italy, Europe (France, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Romania, Czech republic, Russia) and Middle East (Egypt, Saudi Arabia), as well as an expert and proctor for Rotational Atherectomy in very calcified lesion (more than 1000 cases as first operator). He is also involved in many scientific projects with more than 130 papers in the field of CTO and Complex PCI.

Sa’ar Minha MD is a professor of cardiology at Tel-Aviv University, Israel, and the director of interventional cardiology at Shamir Medical Center, Be’er Yaakov in Israel- one of the largest government-owned hospitals in the country. He also serves as the secretary of the interventional cardiology working group under the Israel Heart Society. Prof. Minha earned his MD degree from Tel-Aviv University in Israel and completed an internal medicine residency and cardiology fellowship at Shamir Medical Center. His interventional cardiology fellowship was completed in 2014 at the Washington Hospital Center, affiliated with Georgetown University, Washington DC under Prof. Ron Waksman, Prof. Gus Pichard, and Prof. Lowell Satler. Prof Minha is an active speaker and an invited faculty for major international cardiology conferences and the co-author of over 110 original research publications. His main interests are complex coronary interventions combining physiology and imaging for optimizing results and outcomes, interventions for pulmonary embolism, renal denervation for treating hypertension, and interventions under mechanical circulatory support.

Dr Justin Davies is a honorary 
interventional cardiologist at Hammersmith Hospital, Imperial College NHS Trust, London. After training at Imperial College, he won a prestigious BHF research fellowship to study arterial haemodynamics. Since then he has continued to
work on the development of mathematical algorithms to aid understanding of large artery physiology and to develop new tools to assess arterial disease. The holder of several patents,
he has published widely in the field of hypertension, coronary and large artery physiology and is the winner of many national and international awards. He has several international collaborations, and is the developer of iFR and the co-principal investigator of the ADVISE studies, the DEFINE-FLAIR, ORBITA and DEFINE-PCI studies. Justin also has an interest in renal denervation, and has lead the first-in-man studies to evaluate the safety of this technique to patients with chronic systolic heart failure (REACH studies).