Mount Sinai’s David Adams, MD, Named 2019 President of American Association for Thoracic Surgery
World-renowned mitral valve expert will lead the world’s most prestigious organization of cardiovascular thoracic surgeons.
David H. Adams, MD, the Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis Professor and Chair of the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Cardiac Surgeon-in-Chief of the Mount Sinai Health System, will be named President of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS) at its 98th annual meeting on Saturday, April 28, in San Diego.
“Dr. Adams is an internationally recognized leader in the field of heart valve surgery and mitral valve reconstruction, and we are proud that his achievements have been acknowledged by this prominent organization. As President, Dr. Adams will make significant contributions to the care and treatment of cardiothoracic disease throughout the world,” said Kenneth L. Davis, MD, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Mount Sinai Health System.
“I am very proud of Dr. Adams, his significant contributions to the field, and his strong commitment to improving the field of cardiothoracic surgery at Mount Sinai and around the globe,” said Valentin Fuster, MD, PhD, Director of Mount Sinai Heart and Physician-in-Chief of The Mount Sinai Hospital, who serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC). “I have worked closely with Dr. Adams for many years and have always been impressed with his unwavering devotion to the highest level of patient care.”
The AATS is an international organization of more than 1,300 of the world's foremost cardiothoracic surgeons representing 41 countries. Founded in 1917, the Association is committed to science, education, and research, as demonstrated by its Annual Meeting and its four official journals, the Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Seminars in Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Operative Techniques in Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, and the Pediatric Cardiac Surgery Annual.
As the Program Director of The Mount Sinai Hospital's Mitral Valve Repair Reference Center, Dr. Adams has set national benchmarks, with degenerative mitral valve repair rates of greater than 99 percent, while running one of the largest programs in the United States with a team that now performs more than 400 mitral valve operations per year. Dr. Adams is also President of the Mitral Foundation, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to promoting best practice standards in mitral valve disease, and has co-authored, with Alain Carpentier, MD, PhD, the internationally acclaimed and widest-selling valve textbook, Carpentier's Reconstructive Valve Surgery.
Dr. Adams is also the co-inventor of two mitral valve annuloplasty repair rings (the Carpentier-McCarthy-Adams IMR ETlogix Annuloplasty Ring and the Carpentier-Edwards Physio II Annuloplasty Ring), and is also the inventor of the Medtronic Tri-Ad Adams Tricuspid Annuloplasty Ring. He is a co-director of the annual American College of Cardiology/American Association for Thoracic Surgery Heart Valve Summit, and the Program Director of the biennial AATS Mitral Conclave, the largest international meeting in the world focused on mitral valve disease.
An acclaimed speaker and educator, Dr. Adams has given more than 350 invited global lectures. His dedication to teaching surgery throughout the world is well known and he has performed surgery on more than 200 patients in China, the Dominican Republic, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, Poland, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Dr. Adams’ major research interests include mitral valve repair outcomes, strategies in complex mitral valve repair, and transcatheter valve replacement. Past research honors include the Alton Ochsner Research Scholarship from the AATS and the Paul Dudley White Research Fellowship from the American Heart Association. He has also received honorary Professorships from Capital University in Beijing and Keio University in Tokyo. He has held his current position as Professor and Chair at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai since 2002.
About the Mount Sinai Health System
Mount Sinai Health System is one of the largest academic medical systems in the New York metro area, with more than 43,000 employees working across eight hospitals, over 400 outpatient practices, nearly 300 labs, a school of nursing, and a leading school of medicine and graduate education. Mount Sinai advances health for all people, everywhere, by taking on the most complex health care challenges of our time — discovering and applying new scientific learning and knowledge; developing safer, more effective treatments; educating the next generation of medical leaders and innovators; and supporting local communities by delivering high-quality care to all who need it.
Through the integration of its hospitals, labs, and schools, Mount Sinai offers comprehensive health care solutions from birth through geriatrics, leveraging innovative approaches such as artificial intelligence and informatics while keeping patients’ medical and emotional needs at the center of all treatment. The Health System includes approximately 7,300 primary and specialty care physicians; 13 joint-venture outpatient surgery centers throughout the five boroughs of New York City, Westchester, Long Island, and Florida; and more than 30 affiliated community health centers. We are consistently ranked by U.S. News & World Report's Best Hospitals, receiving high "Honor Roll" status, and are highly ranked: No. 1 in Geriatrics and top 20 in Cardiology/Heart Surgery, Diabetes/Endocrinology, Gastroenterology/GI Surgery, Neurology/Neurosurgery, Orthopedics, Pulmonology/Lung Surgery, Rehabilitation, and Urology. New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai is ranked No. 12 in Ophthalmology. U.S. News & World Report’s “Best Children’s Hospitals” ranks Mount Sinai Kravis Children's Hospital among the country’s best in several pediatric specialties.
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