Dany Jacob

Residency: University of Missouri-Kansas City

When it opened more than 25 years ago, Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute in Kansas City was the nation’s first heart hospital. Since then, it has remained a pacesetter in the treatment of heart disease, attracting top clinicians and researchers from around the world, including Saba 2012 grad Dr. Dany Jacob.

It was during his clinical rotations at Saba that Jacob started to focus on cardiology. Now a first year fellow at the Mid America Heart Institute, he is treating critically ill cardiology patients, performing echocardiograms, cardiac catheterizations—all the procedures of a cardiologist—while also participating in research projects, including one focused on identifying elite athletes at higher risk of sudden cardiac death.

Sudden cardiac death is the most common cause of death in young athletes and has raised fundamental questions: When looking at the heart performance of an athlete what is normal and abnormal? And how can this information be analyzed in order to prevent a sudden cardiac death?

A key way to make determinations in this area is to analyze electrocardiograms (ECGs) of elite athletes and that’s what Jacob is doing: he has published from a database of ECG screenings of Kansas University elite athletes, putting him at the forefront of this groundbreaking research.

Dany came to Saba open to any area of medical study and embraced “the great curriculum and terrific exposure to the multiple areas of medicine” that Saba provided. “I was trained really, really well for the USMLE Step One exam. Everyone in my class was there to do well and were highly focused, which made them great classmates. We were all in it together and focused on our goals.”