My first interest in the practice of medicine began when my father told me stories about his work when I was very young. He was an anesthesiologist practicing in a small local community hospital in rural Maryland. I remember him trying to explain to me what he did everyday and what would happen at the hospital. He would tell me stories of how he and his colleagues were able to fix someone’s broken bone, stop someone from bleeding inside, or deliver a baby. Although I was too young to understand all the technical aspects of his day, I was able to understand the simple concept that my dad’s job was to make sick people feel better. It was one of the aspects of my dad that I deeply respected.

While growing up in a medical family, I also naturally developed an interest in science. In college, I majored in biology because I enjoyed trying to understand what made living things work and how science could potentially improve upon what nature had already created. I developed an appreciation for basic scientific research and came to understand that it was a fundamental part of modern medicine. However, I also realized that my passion did not lie within the laboratory, but rather I wanted to have the opportunity to see science directly help people with medical problems. I wanted to make sick people feel better and therefore chose to become a physician like my father.

During my medical training, I was exposed to various healthcare fields including mental health, internal medicine, and surgery. Each discipline was vitally important, but I chose to become a cardiologist on account of one simple fact – cardiovascular disease is the number one killer in our country. In my opinion, there has been no other specialty that has taken on a disease with such intensity, immediacy, and success. An explosion of new research, new medicine, and new technologies have emerged over the past two decades allowing healthcare providers to more effectively prevent and treat heart disease. I wanted to become a part of that process.

My philosophy with regards to the management of cardiovascular disease can be broken down to a simple mantra: the best way to treat heart disease is to prevent it. Because many manifestations of cardiovascular disease are currently incurable, prevention provides the best line of defense. Prevention is a multifaceted task involving education, lifestyle modification, medication when appropriate, and most importantly, patient responsibility. One critical component of prevention is the screening for and management of high cholesterol. There is a clear relationship between cholesterol levels and the development of heart disease. This major risk factor is easily identified and can be readily treated either with medication or alternative therapies, often times requiring a combination of treatments. Management of cholesterol is also a vital component in the treatment of established heart disease. Aggressive control of cholesterol levels have been shown to reduce the risk of heart attack, heart failure, stroke, and death.