Dr. Deepak Gangahar – arguably the most recognized cardiac surgeon in Nebraska – has been named professor and chief of the thoracic and cardiovascular surgery section in the University of Nebraska Medical Center’s department of surgery. Dr. Gangahar will practice at UNMC’s hospital partner, The Nebraska Medical Center.
The appointment, which is effective Feb. 1, will open the door for the medical center to create a regional center of excellence for patients experiencing heart failure and will include heart transplantation, said Byers Shaw, M.D., professor and chairman of the UNMC department of surgery and a transplant surgeon for The Nebraska Medical Center.
“I personally am very excited that Deepak has joined us,” Dr. Shaw said. “With critical support from the UNMC College of Medicine and The Nebraska Medical Center, his reputation, skills and passion for excellence will take our programs in education, research and clinical service to new heights of accomplishment.
“Dr. Gangahar’s tremendous clinical experience and his demonstrated expertise in advanced cardiac surgery will revitalize the medical center’s clinical, educational and research programs related to heart disease. He will complement the medical center’s recognized preeminence in cardiovascular research, led by Dr. Irving Zucker and housed in the newly opened Durham Research Center.”
Dr. Shaw said Dr. Gangahar will provide surgical leadership for the Med Center’s advanced cardiac disease programs, offering a variety of critical services including heart transplantation and cardiac device implantation.
For the past 18 months, Dr. Gangahar led the surgical program at the Omaha office of the Nebraska Heart Institute (NHI), a group of heart specialists formed in 1987. The NHI office in Omaha is located in the Clarkson Doctor’s Tower South at The Nebraska Medical Center, and Dr. Gangahar has been performing most of his surgeries at The Nebraska Medical Center.
“After coming here, I realized the tremendous potential there is to develop a center of excellence in cardiovascular diseases,” Dr. Gangahar said. “I was aware of the world-class status of the medical center’s bone marrow and organ transplant programs. But, being on campus, and seeing how well these patients do, it hit me that we can do the same thing with cardiac surgery. If we can get liver transplant patients from all over the country, there’s no reason we can’t get patients with heart failure to come here. The challenge is tremendous, but I love a challenge and I know we will succeed.
“My vision is to create a center of excellence, and thanks to the foresight of Dr. Harold Maurer (UNMC chancellor) and the leadership of Glenn Fosdick (president and CEO of The Nebraska Medical Center), I believe it is doable. We’re all heading in the same direction. My conviction has gotten even stronger.”
Dr. Gangahar said the center of excellence will be a resource for the region. “There are five cardiac surgery programs in Omaha, and they all do an excellent job,” he said. “I will now be working for UNMC and The Nebraska Medical Center, but I want to keep my hands of friendship extended as far as possible. When NHI and other centers around the region have patients with advanced heart failure, we want them to consider the medical center a resource that can provide patients with the most state-of-the-art surgical care available.”
Dr. Shaw said the medical center has submitted an application to the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) to start a heart transplant program. Within a matter of months, it is anticipated that UNOS will approve the application, and the medical center will be able to move forward with its heart transplant program.
“This move is critically important in terms of patient care, education and the future of cardiothoracic surgery in Nebraska and surrounding states,” said Joe Graham, chief operating officer of The Nebraska Medical Center. “With the addition of Dr. Gangahar, the hospital is seeking to reactivate its heart transplant program.”
UNMC and The Nebraska Medical Center already operate one of the leading solid organ transplant programs in the country. The program currently includes liver, kidney, pancreas and intestinal transplants. The medical center performed two heart transplants in1987 and 29 more between 1994 and 1999. The program has not been in operation since 1999.
“Deaths from coronary artery disease are declining, but the incidence of heart failure is on the incline,” Dr. Gangahar said. “The incidence of bypass surgery will continue to decrease as we find better ways to treat and avoid the build up of cholesterol in arteries. However, we will be doing more heart failure surgeries in the future such as ventricular or heart remodeling and complex cardiac valvular reconstruction.”
John Gollan, M.D., Ph.D., dean of the UNMC College of Medicine, said he was delighted that an individual of Dr. Gangahar’s stature would be joining the staff at UNMC. Dr. Gangahar, he said, will be the “linchpin” of the heart failure area of the section of cardiology, which has “really stabilized and grown” the past couple of years under the direction of section chief John Windle, M.D.
“The piece that has been missing recently is dedicated expertise in cardiothoracic surgery,” Dr. Gollan said. “Dr. Gangahar will allow us to make a major effort – to increase our focus – on our heart failure program. Dr. Gangahar is another person of star quality that will allow us to attract additional faculty of high quality as we build the program.”
Already, Dr. Gollan said, more than a half-dozen physicians have been recruited over the past few years in the areas of heart disease that focus on areas other than heart failure. These areas include imaging techniques to detect disease; non-surgical, vascular treatments of disease; and dealing with abnormal heart rhythms, such as with pacemakers.
“National trends show that there will be increasing numbers of patients with heart failure,” Dr. Gollan said. “The first approach to treating these patients is with medications, and there is an increasing number of those available. The next phase of treatment is through support devices, essentially an artificial heart approach. Beyond that is heart transplantation. We’re confident that Dr. Gangahar will enhance our expertise in all of these areas of our program.”
A native of India, Dr. Gangahar, 55, completed his internal medicine residency at the Government Medical College at Patiala in Punjab, India, a general surgery residency at the French Polyclinic Medical School and Health Center in New York City, and a thoracic and cardiovascular residency at the University of Utah Affiliated Hospital in Salt Lake City.
Dr. Gangahar came to Lincoln in 1978 to begin his practice. A pioneer in cardiac surgery, Dr. Gangahar was the second surgeon in Nebraska to perform a heart transplant (1986) and the first to perform a lung transplant (1992). Under Dr. Gangahar’s direction, his team of physicians performed nearly 120 heart transplants and nearly 15 lung transplants.
In 1996, he was the first surgeon in the state to perform multivessel coronary bypass surgery without the use of a heart-lung bypass machine. Today, about 80 percent of his bypass surgeries are done “off pump,” meaning the patient’s heart is not stopped and continues to beat throughout the surgical procedure. In addition, Dr. Gangahar was a leader in using laser technology to treat heart patients and in repairing heart valves that would typically be replaced with mechanical valves. In 1987, Dr. Gangahar and his colleagues helped formed NHI. The group opened the Nebraska Heart Hospital in Lincoln earlier this year.
Dr. Gangahar has been active on the local, state and national level in numerous organizations, including the American Heart Association and the American Red Cross. He served as president of Lancaster County Medical Society in 1997 and as governor of the Nebraska Chapter of the American College of Cardiology from 1996 to 1998.