Alumni of the Preventive Cardiology Fellowship in NYU Langone’s Division of Cardiology have contributed significantly to the field of cardiovascular prevention and metabolic health.

Lourdes Santos, MD

Dr. Santos was our program’s first fellow and set the pace for future trainees with her dedication and accomplishments. During her fellowship, she became a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology and passed the qualifying exam to become a specialist in clinical hypertension. She helped establish the cardiovascular disease prevention registry, and received the Young Investigator of the Year Award from the National Lipid Association for her research on familial hyperlipidemia at an internal medicine practice.

Dr. Santos currently serves on the board of directors of the Philippine Lipid and Atherosclerosis Society. She lectures on dyslipidemia throughout the Philippines, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Taiwan; teaches clinical lipidology to cardiology fellows and medical students; and trains cardiology fellows and medical students at Philippine General Hospital. Dr. Santos also serves as the Philippines collaborator (under the mentorship of Rody G. Sy, MD) of an International Atherosclerosis Society study exploring existing health services, facilities, and resources available for patients with familial hypercholesterolemia in Asia-Pacific countries, South Africa, and Brazil.

Lisa Tully, MD

During her Preventive Cardiology Fellowship, Dr. Tully became a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology and performed an extensive analysis of our preventive cardiology research registry, which led to a report in a major publication demonstrating that patients receiving cardiovascular intervention have suboptimal control of cardiovascular risk factors.

Dr. Tully was involved in the development and implementation of the Investigation of Motivational Interviewing and Prevention Consults to Achieve Cardiovascular Targets (IMPACT) trial, a study of patients having cardiovascular procedures. Dr. Tully is pursuing a career in general noninvasive cardiology with a focus on preventive cardiology and lipidology.

Amita Singh, MD

During her fellowship, Dr. Singh published review articles on 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring, the treatment of hypertriglyceridemia, and strict glycemic control in patients with type 2 diabetes to prevent macrovascular events. She also conducted independent research in conjunction with the Division of Bariatric Surgery and presented data on a five-year follow-up of laparoscopic gastric banding at the American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions. She also presented two posters at the National Lipid Association Scientific Sessions based on her clinical experiences at the Bellevue Lipid Clinic.

She published four review papers as a fellow as well as a meta-analysis of randomized trials on the efficacy of cilostazol on platelet reactivity and cardiovascular outcomes in patients having percutaneous coronary intervention. Dr. Singh is a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology. She is former faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the Preventive Cardiology group, and is now on the faculty at the University of Chicago.

Joaquin Carral Gomez, MD

During his fellowship training, Dr. Gomez presented an abstract at a National Lipid Association Scientific Session and spoke on hypertension in black populations for the International Society on Hypertension. Dr. Gomez was instrumental in developing educational handouts for patients on heart-healthy diets and co-facilitated sessions on stress reduction for patient care providers at Montefiore Medical Center and at Mount Sinai West in New York City. Dr. Gomez is starting a career in primary care with a focus on preventive cardiology and lipidology in Washington, DC, and plans to continue working on patient education on cardiovascular health for both English and Spanish speakers.

Bora Toklu, MD, MPH

While training in our fellowship, Dr. Toklu assisted with the expansion of the preventive cardiology consult services offered under the Cardiac Electrophysiology and Stroke services at NYU Langone’s Heart Rhythm Center and Center for Stroke and Neurovascular Diseases. He also completed the National Lipid Association’s Foundations of Lipidology course, participated in the European Atherosclerosis Society’s advanced course in clinical lipidology and cardiovascular prevention, and passed exams for the American Board of Clinical Lipidology and the American Society of Hypertension exam to become a certified hypertension specialist.

Dr. Toklu contributed to 10 peer-reviewed journal publications during his fellowship, including a study that evaluated the safety and the efficacy of beta blockers in acute myocardial infarction. He also participated in several poster presentations at national conferences. Dr. Toklu completed a general cardiology fellowship at Mount Sinai Heart at Mount Sinai Beth Israel, and subsequently completed an interventional cardiology fellowship at Montefiore Medical Center.

Matthew Weiss, MD

Dr. Weiss completed training courses and certification examinations from the National Lipid Association, the American Board of Clinical Lipidology, and the American Society of Hypertension during his fellowship. Additionally, he published abstracts related to his work on lipoprotein(a) and advanced therapies for homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia. He published articles related to type 2 myocardial infarction, the significance of lipoprotein(a) as a risk factor in traditionally well-controlled patients with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, as well as a review of the cardiovascular effects of common and novel antidiabetic medications. Dr. Weiss also co-authored a book chapter on the diagnosis and management of complex dyslipidemias.

He continued his training in cardiovascular disease, completing his fellowship and serving as chief of cardiology at the Mount Sinai Hospital in NYC. He is a fellow of the National Lipid Association and has served on that organization's national board, as well as contributed to their online educational program content creation. He currently works for the Billings Clinic and practices non-invasive cardiology with a specific attention to prevention in Missoula, MT.

Tony Mathews, MD, MPH

Dr. Mathews completed training courses, board certification examination in Lipidology offered by the American Board of Clinical Lipidology during his fellowship. During his training, Dr. Mathews presented a poster on the results of the IMPACT trial and co-authored a book chapter on the roles and appropriate uses of registered dietitians and nutritionists in the primary care setting. He also worked on a quality improvement project that demonstrated that an electronic medical record based heart failure pathway for hospitalized patients led to a lower 30-day readmission rate, shorter length of stay, and improved diuresis in patients with heart failure at NYU Langone. Dr. Mathew’s interests includes cost-effectiveness analysis and outcomes research. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology.

Anish Vani, MD

While training in our program, Dr. Vani received the National Lipid Association Young Investigator Award and presented his research at national and international conferences. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology and a certified hypertension specialist. Dr. Vani has collaborated on multiple research projects, including an extensive review on the newer generation of diabetes medications and their link to cardiovascular benefit, the evaluation of the safety of low levels of LDL cholesterol, and the examination of disparities in cardiovascular risk factor control.

After his fellowship, Dr. Vani continued his training in NYU Langone’s Fellowship in Cardiovascular Disease. He plans to collaborate on projects involving lipoprotein (a) and its role in cardiovascular disease. He has also joined the National Lipid Association South Asian Working Group exploring the prevention and management of cardiovascular disease in South Asians in the United States. In the upcoming academic year, he has been selected to serve as a liaison for the American Heart Association Greater New York Fellows Society.

Gaurav Sharma, MD

Dr. Sharma learned the complexities of lipid management during his Preventive Cardiology Fellowship and is now a diplomat of the American Board of Clinical Lipidology. He had the privilege of seeing patients as an attending in the inaugural plant based lifestyle medicine program, where he and his other team members assisted patients with cardiometabolic conditions to achieve dramatic improvement in their health with a combination of an intensive lifestyle approach and traditional medical management. He hopes to use all of his skills in private practice in Rochester, NY, where he will be a non-invasive cardiologist focusing in prevention and cardiovascular imaging at Rochester Regional Sands-Constellation Heart Institute.

Seth Parham, MD

Prior to our program, Dr. Parham completed his residency at the University of Mississippi and a fellowship in endocrinology, diabetes and lipid research at Washington University in St. Louis, illustrating the close clinical and teaching overlap between cardiology and endocrinology. During his year with us, he learned the nuances of preventive cardiology, complex genetic lipid disorders, and refractory hypertension. He also joined the American Society for Preventive Cardiology and the Obesity Society.

Jack Bostrom, MD

During his Preventive Cardiology Fellowship, Dr. Bostrom became a member of the National Lipid Association and the American Society for Preventive Cardiology. He co-authored several review articles on the role of obesity management in the prevention of atherosclerosis with publications in Current Atherosclerosis Reports and the American Journal of Preventive Cardiology and is currently in the process of submitting a review on the link between pre-diabetes and cardiovascular disease in collaboration with Jonathan Newman, MD, MPH. He presented (virtually) an abstract at the annual American College of Cardiology meeting on the use of latent class analysis to identify novel phenotypes in older adults with atrial fibrillation. He is also in the process of publishing an opinion piece in Circulation with Jeffrey S. Berger, MD. He will be continuing his training as a general cardiology fellow near his home at Boston University Medical Center.

David Lee, MD

Dr. Lee made the most of his time during fellowship by counseling patients at NYU Langone and NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue on ways to decrease future atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease risk. He became a member of the National Lipid Association and took their Foundations of Lipidology course. He has also been working on a review article regarding the use of allopurinol in patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction as well as a couple of case reports involving uncommon patient scenarios encountered during his fellowship. Dr. Lee will continue his training as a fellow in cardiovascular disease at the University of Missouri School of Medicine, where he is excited to bring the knowledge he gained to help his patients in Mid-Missouri.