%0 Journal Article
%T Characteristics of cardiothoracic surgeons practicing at the  top-ranked US institutions
%A Carlo Maria Rosati
%A Daniela Molena
%A David Blitzer
%A Katherine W. Su
%A Leonard N. Girardi
%A Leonidas G. Koniaris
%A Mario Gaudino
%A Mohammad Tahboub
%A Panos N. Vardas
%J SCIE-indexed Journal
%D 2016
%R 10.21037/jtd.2016.11.72
%X Several US cardiothoracic (CT) surgical centers are renowned for their busy clinical volumes and outstanding outcomes, together with conducting innovative research and imparting state-of-the-art education. We previously showed that the annual rankings released by US News & World Report (USNWR), which are generally regarded as a reasonable correlate of the quality of patient care provided at a certain institution, are also a valid synthetic measure of the overall academic productivity of a CT surgical center, while ranking on the basis of National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding for research or designation as a stand-alone department vs. as a dependent division is not (1). In particular we found that CT surgical centers with the highest rankings in several USNWR hospital categories (such as ˇ°Honor Rollˇ±, ˇ°Adult Cardiology and Heart Surgeryˇ±, ˇ°Adult Pulmonologyˇ±, and ˇ°Adult Cancerˇ±) have the CT surgical faculty with the highest academic impact, as measured by their median H index. We also found that having a chairperson with a high personal academic output (in particular: a chairperson with an individual H index ˇÝ50) has a beneficial impact on the scholarly productivity of the whole team. However, many topics remain to be addressed in order to pinpoint the characteristics that are truly necessary for professional success in CT surgery (2)
%U http://jtd.amegroups.com/article/view/10536/html