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Heart Talks: A Series of the 5th Global Summit on Circulatory Health

Rethinking the future of the cardiovascular workforce.

Since 2016, the World Heart Federation has been convening leaders and innovators in cardiovascular health at its annual Global Summit on Circulatory Health.

The Summit is an exclusive annual event where government, civil society, industry, and academia from around the world come together to discuss, debate and explore the future of cardiovascular health.

This year, due to exceptional circumstances related to the COVID-19 pandemic, we had to make the difficult but necessary decision to cancel the in-person 5th Global Summit scheduled to take place October in Washington, D.C.

However, not being able to meet in person does not mean we will stop advocating for the health workforce.

This year, the 5th Global Summit is spinning off into an innovative webinar series called Heart Talks: A Series of the 5th Global Summit on Circulatory Health:

  • Four 1.5 hour interactive webinars
  • Accessible to everyone, everywhere – both live and recorded
  • Held every two weeks between October – November
  • Including topics on CVD management in the post COVID-19 era and the role of the health workforce, the impact of telemedicine and AI, and the importance of adequate financing for health in times of economic instability.

Interested in heart health? Get involved.

Programme

7:00 PT | 10:00 EST | 16:00 CET | 19:30 IST

Beyond Doom and Gloom:
The future of CVD & NCD management in the current and post COVID-19 era

This webinar explored the future of circulatory health management following one of the most tumultuous years for global health in recent history. The conversation brought together speakers from international organizations, academia and civil society, as well as the voices of health workers and patients on the ground, to address both present challenges and future opportunities for circulatory health.

Watch the video summary

Watch the webinar

7:00 PT | 10:00 EST | 16:00 CET | 19:30 IST

What will the post-COVID workforce look like and how will it be trained? Turning an access to care crisis into integrated care delivery systems

The webinar explored what we can do to make sure the health workforce is ready when the next global health crisis hits.

Watch the video summary

Watch the webinar

5:00 PT | 8:00 EST | 14:00 CET | 18:30 IST

Tomorrow is already here: what do telemedicine and AI mean for health professionals and people living with circulatory diseases?

This webinar explored innovations in delivering care for those living with circulatory disease and asked what we can do as advocates, policymakers, and clinicians to make digital health work for stronger health systems and workforces.

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Watch the webinar

7:00 PT | 10:00 EST | 16:00 CET | 20:30 IST

Beyond handclapping for health workers: how can we ensure that adequate financing for health in an economic downturn leads to increased access?

Watch the video summary

SPEAKERS

Prof Thomas A. Gaziano

Thomas A. Gaziano M.D., M.Sc. is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH). Dr. Gaziano graduated from Oxford University where he was a Rhodes Scholar and is graduated from Harvard Medical School and Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. He completed residency and fellowship training in Internal Medicine and Cardiovascular Disease respectively at BWH. He is the Director of both the Global Health Policy and Prevention Unit within the Cardiovascular Division at BWH where he integrates innovative prevention programs in clinical services. He is currently a principal or co-principal investigator on four NIH-funded grants in Argentina and South Africa, the main focus of which are the implementation of effective cardiovascular therapies or policies in low-income settings. The implementation work includes innovations in new technologies and task sharing. He holds a secondary appointment at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health where he works at the Center for Health Decision Science. The focus of his work at the Center is the application of his CVD PREDICT model to evaluate health outcomes, financial impacts, and the cost-effectiveness of CVD intervention strategies. Dr. Gaziano is a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology (ACC) and is a Board Member of The World Heart Federation (WHF). He served as a co-editor of the Cardiovascular and Metabolic Volume of the Disease Control Priorities Project in Developing Countries supported by the Gates Foundation. He serves as an editor or expert reviewer for several high-impact cardiovascular journals. He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles and textbook chapters.

 

Sir George Alleyne

Sir George Alleyne is Director Emeritus of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO). He was elected Director of PAHO in 1995, and served in that position until 2003. Dr. Alleyne was Chancellor of the University of the West Indies (UWI) and visiting professor at the Bloomberg School of Public Health and Johns Hopkins University between 2003 and 2017. From 2003 to 2010, he served as the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean. Dr. Alleyne joined PAHO in 1981. Prior to this, he served as Chair of the Department of Medicine at UWI beginning in 1976, having first been appointed Professor of Medicine in 1972. Dr. Alleyne has an extensive scientific bibliography and has given numerous presentations and lectures about a variety of health issues. In 2001, Dr. Alleyne was awarded the Order of the Caribbean Community, the highest honor that can be conferred on a Caribbean national. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II made him Knight Bachelor in 1990 for his services to medicine. Dr. Alleyne is a medical graduate of UWI.

Dr Lilian Mbau

Dr Lilian Mbau is a medical doctor and a public health practitioner. She is currently the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Kenya Cardiac Society (KCS). She holds a Master of Public Health degree from Moi University and a Global Executive Master of Business Administration in Health from United States International University. She furthered her training on Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) by attending a specialized training at the London School of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene looking at Issues on Global NCD as well as a Postgraduate Diploma in Diabetes from the University of South Wales. Dr. Mbau has also completed a Global Health Leadership Fellowship program with the Afya Bora Consortium and is an awardee of the Global Scholars Cancer Advocacy grant from the American Cancer Society. She has extensive experience managing large scale NCD projects in resource limited settings as well as advocacy for prioritization of NCDs.  Her areas of interests are increasing access to quality and affordable health care for patients with NCDs with a special focus on Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs) as well as preventative health.

 

Dr Pamela Cipriano

Dr Pamela Cipriano is the Dean at the University of Virginia’s School of Nursing in Charlottesville, VA. Prior to this appointment, she served two terms as the president of the American Nurses Association (ANA), the largest nurses organization in the United States representing the interests of the nation’s 4 million registered nurses from 2014 through 2018.  Dr. Cipriano has extensive experience as an academic medical center executive and her career is marked by a focus on improving the quality and safety of services and the work environment for all staff.  Cipriano’s advocacy for the nursing profession is well-recognized. She is known nationally and internationally as a strong advocate for quality, growing nursing’s influence on health care policy, and leading efforts to advance the role and visibility of nurses. She served as a public-sector adviser in the U.S. delegation to the 69th World Health Assembly in 2016, and currently serves as the 1st Vice President of the International Council of Nurses. In addition to her administrative and teaching experience, she has been instrumental in promoting the role technology can play in strengthening the safety and efficiency of care delivery. Her recent work with the National Academy of Medicine’s Action Collaborative on Clinician Well-Being and Resilience has focused on reducing regulatory burden and revamping electronic documentation to relieve clinicians of unnecessary work. Among her many honors and awards for exceptional leadership and contributions to the profession, she was the Distinguished Nurse Scholar-in-Residence at the Institute of Medicine in 2010-11 and is a fellow of the American Academy of Nursing, earning its Healthcare Leader Award in 2018.  She was named among the “Top 100 Most Influential People in (U.S.) Healthcare” by Modern Healthcare magazine for four consecutive years (2015 to 2018), and also in 2015 as one of its “Top 25 Women in Healthcare.”

 

Dr Rachel Wanjiku

Dr Rachel Wanjiku is a Medical Officer and Non-Communicable Diseases (NCD) Champion in Kitui county, Kenya. Dr. Wanjiku received training on the implementation of the National Cardiovascular Management Guidelines in Kenya as part of an ongoing joint project run by the Kenya Cardiac Society and the World Heart Federation with funding from Access Accelerated.  

 

Dr Richard Horton

Richard Horton is Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet.  He qualified in physiology and medicine with honours from the University of Birmingham in 1986. He joined The Lancet in 1990, moving to New York as North American Editor in 1993. In 2016, he chaired the Expert Group for the High Level Commission on Health Employment and Economic Growth, convened by Presidents Hollande of France and Zuma of South Africa. From 2011 to 2015, he was co-chair of the UN’s independent Expert Review Group on Information and Accountability for Women’s and Children’s Health. In 2011, he was elected a Foreign Associate of the US Institute of Medicine and, in 2015, he received the Friendship Award from the Government of China. In 2019 he was awarded the WHO Director-General’s Health Leaders Award for outstanding leadership in global health and the Roux Prize in recognition of innovation in the application of global health evidence.  He wrote Health Wars (2003) about contemporary issues in medicine and health He has a strong interest in global health and medicine’s contribution to our wider culture. He now works to develop the idea of planetary health – the health of human civilizations and the ecosystems on which they depend. 

 

Dr Pascal Michon

Dr Pascal Michon is a Medical Doctor graduated from the University of Paris VI (France), specialized in Cardiology & Vascular Diseases. He started his career in 1995, as a clinician in Cardiology, in Lille’s University Hospital Centre (France), in several units, notably the Cardiology Intensive Care Unit. In 2002, he joined Sanofi in France in Medical Affairs, having different positions with increasing levels of responsibility within Sanofi France, in Cardiology and Thrombosis, among others. In 2011, he was appointed as Responsible of the Cardio-Renal Franchise in France, and then in 2014 became Scientific Affairs Director of Sanofi French affiliate. In 2017, he joined Sanofi Global organization, in General Medicine, as Medical Responsible of Global Established Products, and is now in the position of Head of Cardiovascular & Established Products Global Medical Franchise, being responsible, within the Medical organisation, of a broad Sanofi portfolio in several therapeutic areas, from Cardiovascular, Thrombosis, Hypertension, Anti-Infectives, Legacy Oncology and Central Nervous System.

 

Dr Taskeen Khan

Dr Taskeen Khan is a medical specialist in community health from South Africa. She holds a Master of Medicine in public health from the University of the Witwatersrand as well as a postgraduate qualification in health economics from the University of Cape Town. Taskeen currently leads the area of hypertension and cardiovascular diseases at the World Health Organization in Geneva since 2017 and has made a significant contribution to the development and implementation of the HEARTS technical package. She worked for the African regional office and South African country office of WHO before joining headquarters. Taskeen has also worked in clinical medicine at the primary care level and with academia. Her special interests include health systems and health policy.

 

Jim Campbell

Jim Campbell is the director of the Health Workforce Department at the World Health Organization. He oversees the development and implementation of global public goods, evidence and tools to inform national and international investments in the education, development and retention of the health and social sector workforce in pursuit of global health security, universal health coverage and the Sustainable Development Goals. The department’s work includes the State of the World’s Nursing Report, WHO’s Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health: Workforce 2030, the report of the High-level Commission on Health Employment and Economic Growth and the subsequent adoption of the ILO, OECD, WHO action plan on Working for Health to implement the Commission’s recommendations. He coordinates the Global Health Workforce Network engaging member states and relevant partners in WHO’s work. Prior to joining WHO and GHWA he spent eight years as the founder/Director of a not-for-profit research institute. His publications include A Universal Truth: No Health Without a Workforce (2013), and the State of the World’s Midwifery reports (2011 and 2014). He is a Board member of the International Institute for Educational Planning.

Dr David J. Skorton

David J. Skorton, MD, is president and CEO of the AAMC (Association of American Medical Colleges), a not-for-profit association representing all 154 accredited U.S. and 17 accredited Canadian medical schools, nearly 400 major teaching hospitals and health systems, and more than 80 academic societies. Through these institutions and organizations, the AAMC also represents more than 173,000 full-time faculty members, 89,000 medical students, 129,000 resident physicians, and 60,000 graduate students and postdoctoral researchers in the biomedical sciences. Dr. Skorton began his leadership of the AAMC in July 2019 after a distinguished career in government, higher education, and medicine.

Before joining the AAMC, Dr. Skorton served as the 13th secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, where he oversaw 19 museums, 21 libraries, the National Zoo, numerous research centers, and education programs. Key accomplishments during his tenure include the opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall, the completion of a $1.88 billion campaign to support high-priority initiatives, and the development of a bold strategic plan, which included goals to reach one billion people annually by 2022 through a “digital first” strategy and to convene national conversations on issues critical to the United States. He also diversified the Smithsonian’s leadership, with women and people of color accounting for 69% of new hires at the director level or above during his tenure, including the first female director of the National Air and Space Museum and the first woman to be named director of the National Museum of American History. The Smithsonian’s American Women’s History Initiative also was created during his tenure, as well as plans for the first Latino Gallery on the National Mall.

Dr. Skorton served as president of Cornell University from 2006 to 2015. Under his leadership, the university won an international competition to establish a technology campus (a joint academic venture between Cornell and the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology) in New York City, New York, and completed the largest capital campaign in Cornell’s history. He also made student, faculty, and staff mental health a priority during his tenure, and was recognized by the university naming the Skorton Center for Health Initiatives related to student well-being.

Dr. Skorton also served as president of the University of Iowa from 2003 to 2006. As a member of its faculty for 26 years, he specialized in the treatment of adolescents and adults with congenital heart disease and pioneered cardiac imaging and computer image processing techniques. He also was co-director and co-founder of the university’s Adolescent and Adult Congenital Heart Disease Clinic.

Dr. Skorton received his bachelor’s degree in psychology from Northwestern University and his medical degree from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and completed his medical residency and fellowship in cardiology at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he also was chief medical resident.

 

Dr Anna Stavdal

Dr Anna Stavdal is a family medicine specialist who has been working for 30 years in Oslo inner city, as well as Associate professor at Oslo University since 1996, teaching undergraduate students and training family medicine residents. Dr. Stavdal is active in public debate, acolumnist for many years, an experienced speaker and passionate advocate for primary care and family medicine.

She has been holding leading positions in family medicine organisations for 25 years, at the Norwegian, Nordic, European and now global level. Voted WONCA World president- elect in 2018, Dr. Stavdal will take office as president in November 2020. WONCA is the World Organisation of Family Doctors, – worldwide representing more than ½ million family doctors engaged in research, education and professional development.

A main area of interest for Dr. Stavdal is how family doctors can be enabled to adapt to current trends, – like digitalization, increased fragmentation and specialization in medicine -, and still provide personal, continuous and comprehensive care at first point of contact.

 

Dr Andrea Beratarrechea

Dr. Andrea Beratarrechea is an internal medicine physician and holds a Master in Clinical Effectiveness from the University of Buenos Aires. She works as a senior researcher at the South American Center of Excellence for Cardiovascular Health (CESCAS) in the Institute for Clinical Effectiveness and Health Policy (IECS) and in the Argentine National Research Council (CONICET) in Buenos Aires. She was a consultant for the Directorate of Health Promotion and Control of NCDs, Ministry of Health. She is a Bernard Lown Scholar at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and her research includes the development, implementation and evaluation of complex interventions that include eHealth tools to prevent and control of CVD and NCDs in low resource settings in low- and middle-income countries in Latin America.

 

Dr Lawrence J Appel

Lawrence J Appel, MD, MPH is the C. David Molina Professor of Medicine and Director of the Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research, a joint program of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the Bloomberg School of Public Health.  Dr. Appel is a primary care internist who holds a primary appointment in the Department of Medicine with joint appointments in Epidemiology, International Health, and Nursing. In addition, he directs the ProHealth Clinical Research Unit.

The focus of his career is the conduct of clinical, epidemiologic, and translational research pertaining to the prevention and control of high blood pressure, cardiovascular-kidney diseases, and other chronic conditions, primarily through nutrition-based interventions.  His principal lines of research are:

  • controlled feeding trials, such as the DASH trial, which test optimal dietary strategies to lower blood pressure and cardiovascular risk;
  • behavioral intervention trials, such as the POWER trial, which test novel strategies to accomplish lifestyle modification, often focused on obesity;
  • trials and observational studies, such as AASK and CRIC, which identify risk factors for the progression of chronic kidney disease and its complications.
  • global efforts to prevent and control hypertension, specifically, Resolve to Save Lives, which takes a systems-level approach to identify and address factors, such as workforce capacity, training, and medication supply chain, that prevent optimal care.

Over the course of his career, he has conducted and led cohort studies, clinical trials, systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and modeling studies.

 

Dr John Jarcho

John Jarcho is a deputy editor at the New England Journal of Medicine, assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, and a member of the cardiovascular division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. Dr. Jarcho received his MD degree from the University of Utah School of Medicine in Salt Lake City, Utah. He completed a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in cardiovascular disease, both at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He joined the faculty of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in 1989. Dr. Jarcho’s professional career initially focused on basic research and led to the first identification of a genetic locus for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. He then shifted his focus to clinical medicine, becoming a member of the Brigham Cardiac Transplant Service and ultimately medical co-director of that service. In 2002 his professional focus shifted again; he became cardiology deputy editor at the online medical reference UpToDate. Finally, in 2005, he joined the editorial staff of the New England Journal of Medicine, where he has served for the past 10 years as the principal editor responsible for the review, revision and editing of manuscripts in the field of cardiovascular disease. He has led efforts by the Journal to establish a capacity for expedited review and rapid online publication of practice-changing clinical trials. He maintains a clinical role with the Brigham Advanced Heart Disease Service.

 

Dr Jennifer Cohn

Dr Jennifer Cohn, MD MPH, is the Senior Vice President for Cardiovascular Health at Resolve to Save Lives, an Initiative of Vital Strategies. She is a physician with a focus on improving access to and uptake of effective health products and models of care in low- and middle-income countries. Before joining Resolve to Save Lives, she served as Senior Director of Innovation at the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) and as the Medical Director of the Médecins Sans Frontières Access Campaign. She is a clinical assistant professor of Infectious Diseases at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Jennifer has served on national and international advisory groups on TB, HIV and viral hepatitis. She is published in peer-reviewed journals including the Lancet, PLoS Medicine and Science.

Jennifer received her MD from University of Pennsylvania, is board certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases and earned her Masters in Public Health at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.

 

Omnia El Omrani

Omnia El Omrani is a 24-year-old medical student from Cairo, Egypt with an irrevocable passion for global health and advocacy. She is the Liaison Officer for Public Health Issues in the International Federation of Medical Students Association, representing the stance of 1.3 million medical students worldwide from 125 countries. She has been working on youth empowerment, NCDs and climate change advocacy for 5 years on a local, national and global level. SDG 3.5 and 11 are the main focus areas that inform her advocacy work.

She actively participated in five high-level meetings including Prince Mahidol Award Conference UHC Forum, the 3rd Ministerial Road Safety Conference and Conference of Parties 24 and 25, where she advocated for meaningful youth engagement at decision-making processes. She also facilitated a Climate and Health Workshop in the NCD Alliance Forum 2020 in Sharjah in collaboration with Global Climate and Health Alliance and Wellcome Trust. She believes in the significance of the involvement of youth as key stakeholders in the global health agenda.

Prof Clara Chow

Professor Clara Chow is Academic Director of the Westmead Applied Research Centre (WARC), Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney. She is a cardiologist and the Program Director of Community Based Cardiac Services at Westmead hospital, Sydney, Australia. She currently holds honorary appointments as the Charles Perkins Centre Westmead Academic Co-director and President-elect of the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand. Professor Chow’s research focuses on the prevention of cardiovascular disease, innovation in the delivery of cardiovascular care and the evaluation of digital health interventions. She has expertise in the design, delivery and implementation of clinical trials. Her PhD from the University of Sydney, Australia was in cardiovascular epidemiology and international public Health and her Postdoc from McMaster University, Canada in clinical trials and cardiac imaging. She is supported by a NSW Health Clinician Scientist Fellowship.

 

Patrick Wayte

Patrick Wayte is Senior Vice President of the AHA’s Center for Health Technology and Innovation. In this role he leads integrated digital health initiatives across the health continuum – with a focus on secondary prevention, healthcare transition, chronic care, and the use and application of the AHA’s science to digital platforms and technologies.

Prior to the American Heart Association and his role in healthcare, Patrick held positions in integrated marketing, strategy and new product development in the telecommunications and automotive industries with a focus on developing new lines of business through acquisition-partnerships-innovation. Patrick holds a degree in Economics from the University of California, San Diego and an MBA from Vanderbilt University.

 

Jaimie Guerra

Jaimie Guerra is at the World Health Organization in the External Relations division where she supports advocacy, partnerships and communications. In her previous role at WHO, she helped create the first ever WHO Investment Case and partnership strategy.

In 2017 she supported the work of the WHO Transformation, where she played an integral role of the launch of the WHO Innovation hub. Most recently her team has supported the COVID-19 response by launching informational chatbots and AI tools during the pandemic. Before WHO, Jaimie worked in public relations for a venture capital firm hosting the largest fund for medical technologies in Switzerland.

 

Prof Dorairaj Prabhakaran

Professor Dorairaj Prabhakaran, educated at Bangalore Medical College (MBBS), the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (MD: Internal Medicine and DM: Cardiology) and McMaster University Canada MSc: Health Research Methodology), is an eminent cardiologist, epidemiologist and academician of global repute. He moved beyond the conventional world of clinical cardiology to advance science in the prevention of heart diseases and diabetes in India so that his work could benefit millions of people in this country.

He established large population cohorts in India which have provided major insights in diverse domains, ranging from epidemiology, biomarkers, role of nutrition, on heart diseases and diabetes. Evaluation of task shifting and mobile-phone-based solutions for providing personalized patient management solutions, and Yoga-care in cardiac rehabilitation (both of which were selected for the prestigious late-breaking presentation at the American Heart Association meeting in 2018), are two best exemplars of low cost, context-specific solutions to enhance quality of therapeutic and preventive care for chronic diseases in India. A low-cost worksite wellness program designed by his team with this philosophy was applauded by the 2008 World Economic Forum report, as one of the best worksite programs.

Prof Prabhakaran’s contribution to capacity building in chronic disease health research and training is exemplary. He was the founding Director of the Centre of Excellence in Cardia‐ metabolic Risk Reduction in South Asia, one of the 11 centres worldwide supported under the Global Health Initiative of National Institutes of Health (NIH) of USA. This centre has now transformed into an international partnership namely ‘Centre for Control of Chronic Conditions (CCCC)’ between four world‐class institutions: the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Emory University, LSHTM and PHFI. He is an exceptional mentor of doctoral, post‐doctoral and physician scientists nationally and internationally, many of whom have become leaders in heart disease research. Prof. Prabhakaran has by far, more than 500 publications in scientific journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet, Circulation, British Medical Journal, Nature, JAMA, etc. and has an H‐Index of 83. He was the lead editor of a major two volume textbook of Cardiology which has been well received. He has been listed as the topmost researcher in Medicine in India terms of publications for the years 2009-2014 by Scopus and Department of Science & Technology, Government of India.

 

Dr Alexandra Goncalves

Alexandra Goncalves is the Philips Chief Medical Officer, Strategy, M&A and Partnerships, a position she has held since June 2019. As an academic cardiologist with business acumen, she provides functional leadership for clinical innovation and clinical strategy for Philips. Alexandra works closely and collaboratively with business, research and functional leaders across the organization, as well as exploring inorganic growth opportunities.

Alexandra started her career as an academic cardiologist in Portugal and Spain and her past experience includes research in epidemiology and clinical trials in the Cardiovascular Department at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital/ Harvard Medical School (HMS). She earned a Master in Medical Sciences from HMS and while working as a clinical cardiologist, she earned a doctorate degree (PhD). Alexandra joined Philips in 2016 and worked three years as Sr. Medical Director for the Ultrasound business.

Alexandra is an internationally recognized thought leader with business acumen and an extensive record of multi-disciplinary medical collaborations, as educator, committee leader, author, and editor. She serves as an Affiliate Professor of Medicine in Portugal and has been awarded several prizes, including the prestigious Senior Clinical Research and Career Development Award from HMS and Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology.

 

Dr Benjamin Scirica

Dr Benjamin Scirica graduated from Harvard Medical School and trained in internal medicine and cardiovascular medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. He has a Master of Public Health degree from Harvard School of Public Health. He is currently Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Senior Investigator at the TIMI Study Group (an academic research organization based at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, which has performed over 70 clinical trials in atherosclerotic heart disease). He is Director of Innovation in the cardiovascular division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, which has developed a series of remote disease management programs.

His research interests center on the identification and application of novel cardiac biomarkers and therapeutic strategies across the spectrum of cardiometabolic disease. He was principal investigator of the AVANT GARDE-TIMI 43 trial and CAMELLIA-TIMI 61 and co-investigator of the MERLIN-TIMI 36, TRA 2Pº-TIMI 50, and SAVOR-TIMI 53 trials. He is the Director of the TIMI ECG Core Laboratory, which has analyzed over 20,000 continuous and static ECGs from multiple trials in acute coronary syndromes.

Dr. Scirica has authored or co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed articles and serves on the editorial board of ACCEL He practices in the Levine Cardiac Intensive Care Unit, cardiology in-patient service, and the Watkins Cardiovascular Clinic at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

 

Dr Ben Miled

Dr Ben Miled is a senior member of IEEE and an associate professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Dept. at Indiana Univ. Purdue Univ. Indianapolis. Her research interests include machine learning, data analytics, knowledge discovery, data models and large-scale service-oriented software architectures. She has co-authored several technical papers in journals and conference proceedings. She was also the recipient of the Indiana Women in High Tech Award and the National Science Foundation Career Award.

Dr Lina Matta

Lina Matta, MPH, BCPS is Director of Ambulatory Pharmacy, Clinical Pharmacy Practice Manager (Inpatient), and Director of the PGY2 Cardiology Pharmacy Residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), Department of Pharmacy Services, in Boston MA.  During her tenure at BWH, Lina has lead the expansion of clinical pharmacy services across several multidisciplinary teams and she currently directs and collaborates on several hospital-wide clinical and process improvement projects.  Her areas of clinical interest and research include cardiology, care redesign, and population health management. She has published several articles related to clinical topics in cardiology and the outcomes of process improvement initiatives.  Lina graduated with BSPharm, and Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Rutgers University and a Masters in Public Health degree from Harvard University.

 

Deneen Vojta

Deneen Vojta is Executive Vice President for Global Research & Development at UnitedHealth Group (UNH). With 25 years’ experience as an entrepreneur, health system and health plan executive and board member, she develops strategies for growth through innovation and investment. She has spent much of her career focused broadly on accelerating the design, execution and scaling of disruptive programs, leveraging general purpose technologies. Deneen has a strong history of building mutually beneficial partnerships with academics, governments and entrepreneurs to achieve the larger shared goals of improving health care quality, reducing care costs, more effectively engaging consumers in their health.

Deneen began her career at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) where she was a resident in Pediatrics and a fellow in Hematology & Oncology.  Subsequently, she launched CHOP’s pediatric hospitalist program, the first in the Delaware Valley.  She later became Chief Medical Officer of Health Partners and then the Frankford Health System before leaving to found Mynetico, a disease management company acquired by UNH in 2006.  Since joining UNH, she has been part of the leadership team that has built multiple businesses with successful exits.

Dr. Vojta currently serves on the governance board of Childrens’ Minnesota and the advisory board of The Center for Health Incentives & Behavioral Economics at Penn Medicine. In 2014, she was an Emmy ® Award winner and in 2013, a CES® Innovation Design and Engineering Innovation Honoree.

 

Prof. Adolfo Rubinstein

  • Director of the Center for Implementation and Innovation in Health Policies (CIIPS). Institute for Clinical Effectiveness and Health Policy (IECS). Buenos Aires
  • Former National Minister of Health of Argentina (2017-2019)
  • Founder and Former Director General of IECS (2002-2017)

I  was founder and chairman of the Division of Family and Community Medicine at the Hospital Italiano of Buenos Aires, one of the leading teaching hospital in Argentina, until 2010. I received a MSc in Clinical Epidemiology from Harvard School of Public Health in 1996 and a PhD with concentration in Public Health from the University of Buenos Aires in 2000. In 2002, I completed a postgraduate diploma in Health Economics at the University of York, UK. I am now full Professor of Family Medicine, Full Professor of Public Health and founder and former Director of the Master’s program in Clinical Effectiveness of UBA. I am also Visiting scholar of the Lown Cardiovascular program at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health.

From 2009 to 2017, I was Director and PI of the Southern Cone American Centre of Excellence in Cardiovascular Health, (CESCAS/IECS), sponsored by NHLBI. My research is focused on health policy research, cardiovascular and NCD prevention and epidemiology and implementation research to improve prevention and control of NCD in Argentina and Latin America. In 2018 I was appointed as a Commissioner of the WHO Independent High-level Commission on NCDs. I have published more than 120 papers in peer review journals as well as textbooks and book chapters in health policy, clinical epidemiology, health services research and economic evaluations, focusing on NCD epidemiology, different aspects of the practice of primary care, and resource-allocation decision making. I am an investigator of the National Council of Scientific Research of Argentina (CONICET).

 

Prof David Wood

Professor Wood is a cardiologist committed to prevention of cardiovascular disease and holds joint emeritus academic appointments at Imperial College and the National University of Ireland-Galway. He has contributed to international policy and guidelines on cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention through the World Health Organisation, World Heart Federation and the European Society of Cardiology. He was a founder and President of the European Association for Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation, a Board member of the European Society of Cardiology and most recently President of the World Heart Federation (2017-18).

He is the principal investigator for the ASPIRE and EUROASPIRE studies across 27 European countries, evaluating standards of preventive cardiology practice in hospital and primary care. He led the EUROACTION and EUROACTION+ trials in preventive cardiology evaluating nurse-led models of preventive care in hospital and general practice across 8 European countries, and the principals of EUROACTION were incorporated in the Imperial College NHS Cardiovascular Health programme for the NHS. He was Course Director for the Imperial College Masters degree programme in Preventive Cardiology (2008-18) providing education and training for doctors, nurses and allied health professionals.

He is now working for the National Institute of Prevention and Cardiovascular Health at the National University of Ireland-Galway to support the development of research in all aspects of cardiovascular prevention and health, to help expand the MSc course in Preventive Cardiology at NUI-G into a portfolio of MSc courses in cardiovascular health and disease prevention, and to contribute to innovative service development in secondary and primary prevention of CVD.

He is Senior Editor of the European Society of Cardiology Textbook of Preventive Cardiology and also founded the European Journal of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation (now European Journal of Preventive Cardiology) and served as the first Joint Editor in Chief.

 

Amanda Glassman

Amanda Glassman is executive Vice President and Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development and also serves as Chief Executive Officer of CGD Europe. Her research focuses on priority-setting, resource allocation and value for money in global health and aid, as well as data for development. Prior to her current position, she served as director for global health policy at the Center from 2010 to 2016, and has more than 25 years of experience working on health and social protection policy and programs in Latin America and elsewhere in the developing world.

Prior to joining CGD, Glassman was principal technical lead for health at the Inter-American Development Bank, where she led policy dialogue with member countries, designed the results-based grant program Salud Mesoamerica 2015, and served as team leader for conditional cash transfer programs such as Mexico’s Oportunidades and Colombia’s Familias en Accion. From 2005-2007, Glassman was deputy director of the Global Health Financing Initiative at Brookings and carried out policy research on aid effectiveness and domestic financing issues in the health sector in low-income countries. Before joining the Brookings Institution, Glassman designed, supervised and evaluated health and social protection loans at the Inter-American Development Bank and worked as a Population Reference Bureau Fellow at the US Agency for International Development.

Glassman holds a MSc from the Harvard School of Public Health and a BA from Brown University, has published on a wide range of health and social protection topics, and is editor and coauthor of the books What’s In, What’s Out: Designing Benefits for Universal Health Coverage (Center for Global Development 2017), Millions Saved: New Cases of Proven Success in Global Health (Center for Global Development 2016), and From Few to Many: A Decade of Health Insurance Expansion in Colombia (IDB and Brookings 2010).

 

Dr. Timothy Grant Evans

Tim joined McGill University in September 2019, as the Inaugural Director and Associate Dean of the School of Population and Global Health (SPGH) in the Faculty of Medicine and Associate Vice-Principal (Global Policy and Innovation).

He joins McGill after a 6-year tenure as the Senior Director of the Health, Nutrition and Population Global Practice at the World Bank Group.   From 2010 to 2013, Tim was Dean of the James P. Grant School of Public Health at BRAC University in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and Senior Advisor to the BRAC Health Program. From 2003 to 2010, he was Assistant Director General at the World Health Organization (WHO). Prior to this, he served as Director of the Health Equity Theme at the Rockefeller Foundation. Earlier in his career, he was an attending physician of internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and was Assistant Professor in International Health Economics at the Harvard School of Public Health. Tim has been at the forefront of advancing global health equity and strengthening health systems delivery for more than 20 years. At WHO, he led the Commission on Social Determinants of Health and oversaw the production of the annual World Health Report. He has been a co-founder of many partnerships including the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) as well as efforts to increase access to HIV treatment for mothers and innovative approaches to training community-based midwives in Bangladesh. Tim received his Medical Degree from McMaster University in Canada and was a Research and Internal Medicine Resident at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He earned a D.Phil. in Agricultural Economics from University of Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.

 

Edna Adan Ismail

From her time as a trainee nurse and midwife in London in the 1950s to her becoming the First Lady of Somalia, and presently running the pioneering Edna Adan Hospital, Edna has never ceased to be a tireless campaigner and champion of women’s rights and health. Born in Hargeisa in British Somaliland Protectorate, Edna trained as a nurse/midwife in London and returned home 1961. In 1963, she married Mohamed Ibrahim Egal who had been the President of an Independent Somaliland before moving to Libya in 1965 to share her skills as a midwife trainer for the World Health Organization (WHO). She returned to the Horn of Africa in 1967 when her husband became Prime Minister of the Somali Republic.

Despite the tragic setback of the civilian government being overthrown by a military coup led by General Mohamed Siyad Barre in October 1969, Edna Adan persevered with her work and in 1976, became the first woman director in the Somali Ministry of Health.  In 1986, as Somalia descended into civil war, she re-joined WHO as Regional Nursing/midwifery Advisor, served as a Technical Officer for Reproductive Health from 1987-91, and then became WHO Representative in the Republic of Djibouti from 1991-97.

Edna founded the Edna Adan Hospital with the aim of improving women’s health in a region with one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. Established as a maternity teaching hospital with a goal of training 1,000 midwives, over the past 17 years it has grown into a major referral institution for obstetrical, surgical, medical and paediatric cases from a wide geographical area in the Horn of Africa. In parallel to the founding of the hospital, in 2002 Edna embarked upon a career in politics and served as minister of Social Affairs and Family Welfare in Somaliland and as a stellar Foreign Minister from 2003-06.

Among her numerous awards, Edna Adan received the French Légion d’honneur (2011), and was made Commandeur Dans l’Ordre National du 27 Juin, Djibouti (1997). Most recently she was named the inaugural recipient of the Renfield Foundation Award for Global Women’s Health by the University of Pennsylvania and was short-listed for the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in the same year that she was also nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.

 

Dr Samuel O. Jones

Dr. Samuel Jones is a Cardiac Electrophysiologist at the Chattanooga Heart Institute in Tennessee, Electrophysiology Lab Director at Memorial Hospital and Chair of the Health Affairs Committee at the American College of Cardiology. He has a BS (Biology) from the United States Air Force Academy, MD from the University of Alabama School of Medicine, and an MPH from Harvard Medical School. Dr. Jones was Associate Professor of Medicine, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (2013-2017) and Master Academician, Cardiology Service, San Antonio Military Medical Center (2014-2017). He is a Retired Colonel, US Air Force, active duty 1997- 2017.

About the Global Summit

Since 2016, World Heart Federation has been convening leaders and innovators in cardiovascular health at its annual Global Summit on Circulatory Health. The Summit is an invitation-only, two-day event where government, civil society, industry, and academia share, learn and explore what’s next for the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease at a global level. Previous editions have tackled burning issues such as access to essential medicines and digital health.

The aim of the Summit is to convene and mobilize advocates in circulatory health, coordinate stakeholders and policymakers around shared goals, campaign for circulatory health with a collective voice and a clear message, and catalyze action for circulatory health through civil society and policy engagement.

These objectives lead directly to the intended outcomes of the Summit, namely to foster greater connection between participants, issue a collective call to action in light of an urgent need, and discuss concrete next steps for programme implementation.