In this week’s Parallax, host Ankur Kalra is joined by Charles (Chuck) Simonton, Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of Abiomed. Chuck talks about how his father’s leadership and service as a Methodist minister inspired him to become a doctor. He recalls the dawn of interventional cardiology: the birth of angioplasty and stenting. Drawing from his experiences as a trialist who worked with some of the most influential minds, he offers practical tips to young doctors. Finally, Ankur asks Chuck about the Impella device controversy and the recent decision of Abiomed to accelerate their clinical research.

How should you start building a research programme? What are Chuck Simonton’s thoughts on the relationship between doctors and the industry? What is Chuck’s message to young cardiologists?

Martha Gulati, Professor of Medicine and the Chief of Cardiology at the University of Arizona joins Ankur Kalra to continue the important conversation on how the cardiovascular community can stand up against sexism.

After the #MedBikini campaign provoked by a misogynistic study that scrutinized female doctors’ social media posts, this episode is about creating a safer environment for female healthcare professionals.

This week’s guest, Prof Roxana Mehran, Professor of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Founding Director of Women as One, is a phenomenon in interventional cardiology. Her pioneering work as clinician, trialist and advocate is well known within the community. In this episode, we learn what makes Roxana tick and what were the odds she had to defy as an immigrant from Iran to fulfil her ‘impossible dream’.

The charity organisation, Women as One is an agent for women and men to be part of medicine that is built on talent, rather than a privilege. Roxana and Ankur discuss the role of mentorship and family-friendly work environment in mending the broken house of cardiology. Roxana talks about the practical tools that are available for women to take the next steps in their career and achieve their goals.

This week’s guest is Dr Laura Mauri who became Vice President of Global Clinical Research and Analytics at Medtronic in 2018 after an illustrious career in academic medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

Dr Kalra asks Dr Mauri about early influences and her traineeship with legendary interventionalists, the late Donald Baim and Richard Kuntz. Dr Mauri talks openly about her decision-making process and the importance of selecting your priorities and committing to them. Ankur asks Laura about her decision to go into industry. Laura shares her thoughts on medical innovations and meeting urgent needs with unique perspectives.

What is Dr Mauri’s advice for a young cardiologist? How did she balance research and patient care? What are the questions that helped her decision making? How does Dr Mauri think about innovations in medicine?

In the early days of the Black Lives Matter movement, a group of internal medicine residents posed a question: What can we do about racial disparity within our institution? 

Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s Health Equity Committee decided to confront the status quo by asking: How is racism on a structural level present within our walls?

Ankur Kalra’s guests Michelle Morse (Founding Co-Director of EqualHealth and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School) and Lauren Eberly (Cardiology Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania) are co-authors of a retrospective study that demonstrated what had previously only been observed: That black or brown heart failure patients ended up in general medicine rather than specialised cardiology services. Following the publication of the study in November 2019, the Health Equity Committee started to roll out anti-racism trainings and to work on objective admission guidelines to mitigate biased behaviours.

Aarti Bhatt (Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Minnesota), member of the Minnesota chapter of Campaign Against Racism, talks about their initiative to support projects that have a positive impact on local communities on a global scale.

Heart surgery is not the best option for every patient suffering from structural heart disease. This was recognized by interventional cardiologist Anmar Kanaa’N and cardiac surgeon Joseph Lahorra who decided to unify their skillsets and bring the Structural Heart Program to life. Their vision was to offer patients with heart valve diseases all available options at Cleveland Clinic’s Akron General.


In this week’s Parallax, Dr Kanaa’N, the director of the program, and Dr Lahorra, chairman of the Heart, Vascular & Thoracic Department of Akron General introduce the listeners to the foundations of their program and the paradigm shift brought by TAVR.

The State of Ohio reported its first coronavirus cases on March 9. Prior to that, on February 28, the Cleveland Clinic announced that they are prepared to open 1,000 additional hospital beds if needed. Ohio was one of the states to follow recommendations and intervene quickly.

Ankur Kalra asks Grant W Reed, Director of the Cleveland Clinic’s STEMI program, to reflect on the actions they took and the challenges of delaying cardiovascular procedures in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Dr Reed offers insight on the factors that influenced the Cleveland Clinic’s STEMI policy for COVID-19. Ankur and Grant discuss the triage considerations for patients with structural heart disease and the steps the clinic took to protect its healthcare workers.

Lisa Rosenbaum has been writing extensively about the human face of medicine. Her articles have been widely circulated by publications like The New York Times, The New Yorker and The New England Journal of Medicine.

In this edition of Parallax Dr Kalra asked Dr Rosenbaum about the influences that shaped her choices as a writer and as a healthcare professional. Dr Rosenbaum opens up about her childhood and how she connected to her grandfather through writing and medicine. We learn about Lisa’s first day at medical school and her latest writing project.

A week after Jag Singh had tested positive for 2019-nCoV, he became a patient in his hospital’s intensive care unit. This week he joins Ankur Kalra, MD to tell us about his journey as a clinician-scientist.

Jagmeet P Singh, associate chief of the cardiology division at Massachusetts General Hospital and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School joins Ankur Kalra for a deep conversation about his journey across three continents. Dr Singh talks about the importance of choosing fulfilment over success. We gain more insights on the recent late-breaking trial, MADIT-CHIC focusing on cardiac resynchronization therapy. Ankur asks Jag about his experience of being on the other side of the healthcare system and his enrolment in the since halted remdesivir trial.

“It’s a tsunami not just a wave. The worst tsunami you can imagine”


Prof Michele Senni is Director of Cardiology at Papa Giovanni XXIII Hospital, Bergamo Italy. He contracted COVID-19 himself and in this latest podcast he meets with Ankur Kalra, MD to discuss his personal experience in dealing with patients and COVID-19 in Europe’s outbreak epicentre.


Hear them discuss the burden on healthcare, patient selection, the importance of testing and PPE and how COVID has resulted in a reduction of acute myocardial infarction and heart failure in patients.