Friday March 11th, 2022 - Ik-Kyung Jang - Optical Coherence Tomography,

Ik-Kyung Jang, MD, PhD, the Allan and Gill Gray Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS) will speak about Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) and Plaque Erosion. Coronary OCT is an intravascular imaging modality that can be performed during cardiac catheterization. Its higher resolution has allowed visualization of detailed coronary plaque structure.

The talk will offer an overview of:

• History of OCT application in Cardiology
• A new in vivo diagnosis of plaque erosion in patients with acute heart attack
• A potential major shift in the management of patients with heart attack in the future

Ik-Kyung Jang, MD, PhD is a full Professor of Medicine at HMS and holds the Harvard Chair “Allan and Gill Gray Professor of Medicine”. He is the director of the Cardiac OCT Research Laboratory at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and was the first incumbent of the “Michael and Kathryn Park Endowed Chair in Cardiology” at MGH, which he held from 2016-2021. Dr. Jang was named an “Eminent Scholar” at Kyung Hee University in Seoul, South Korea, and has been a member of the nomination committee for the “Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine” for four times including the recent three consecutive years.

Dr. Jang arrived at MGH in 1987 after finishing his clinical training in medicine and cardiology, and receiving PhD at Leuven University in Belgium. Initially, his research focused on the pharmacology and physiology of thrombosis and thrombolysis. Over the years he served as the principal investigator of more than 30 clinical trials including multiple investigator-initiated studies. He pioneered in vivo vascular biology research using OCT in patients with coronary artery disease which began by performing the First-in-human coronary OCT procedure in 1998. In 2010 he established an international OCT Registry, collaborating with more than 25 sites in 9 countries. More than 35 fellows from 10 different countries have trained in Dr. Jang’s laboratory. He has more than 350 publications and has edited three textbooks. In April Dr. Jang will be awarded the “2022 Distinguished Scientist Award” by the American College of Cardiology in recognition of his major scientific contributions to the advancement of scientific knowledge in the field of cardiovascular disease.