Medical pioneer joins FIU College of Medicine


MIAMI – Dr. Barry T. Katzen, whose many career “firsts” include pioneering angioplasty, has joined Florida International University’s Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine as Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs for Baptist Health South Florida.

Katzen, who is founder and medical director of Baptist Cardiac & Vascular Institute, will facilitate the relationship between FIU’s College of Medicine and Baptist Health, one of the medical school’s clinical partners. Katzen’s responsibilities include coordinating the clinical education of FIU medical students at Baptist Health facilities as well as the relationship between faculty at the College of Medicine and the medical staff at Baptist Health. In his duties, he will be collaborating with Javier Hernandez-Lichtl, Corporate Chief Academic Affiliation Officer and CEO of West Kendall Baptist Hospital, who also serves as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the Wertheim College of Medicine.

“I am excited to have the opportunity to shepherd and optimize this evolving relationship between FIU and Baptist Health,” Katzen said. “By combining resources and maximizing our efforts in areas such as patient care, medical education and research, we can build a partnership that will greatly benefit both institutions and our community.”

Dr. John Rock, founding dean of FIU’s College of Medicine, said Katzen will play a key role in one of the medical school’s key partnerships and will help the medical school fulfill its mission of training physicians who will practice medicine in a compassionate and comprehensive manner.

“Dr. Katzen is not only a leader in his field, but a leader in medical education,” Rock said.  “He is a natural teacher whose decades of contributions have advanced our understanding of medicine and our ability to care for patients, as well as enhanced the way we train doctors. That makes him a perfect fit for our College of Medicine.”

Katzen, 63, has been a national site principal investigator for many clinical trials in the study of aneurysms, carotid artery disease, and peripheral vascular disease and has been involved in the development of numerous devices for less invasive vascular therapy.

He is considered one of the pioneers of angioplasty, a technique for opening blocked blood vessels, and has performed numerous “firsts,” including the first renal angioplasty in the United States.  Katzen is considered one of the founders of Interventional Radiology as a specialty of medicine.

Katzen also pioneered the use of video and audio technology to enhance the process of education for established practitioners and  is credited with being the first to use live patient demonstrations in the United States. This became the benchmark for procedural education in his own field of endovascular therapy, as well as many other procedural areas of medicine.

His distinguished academic career includes authoring or co-authoring four textbooks, numerous book chapters, and more than 160 peer-reviewed scientific publications.

Among his many honors, Katzen has twice been recognized as one of the twenty most influential radiologists in the United States and has been listed in Best Doctors in America numerous times.

Katzen is a native of Miami Beach who has a medical degree from the University of Miami. He is married to his high school sweetheart, Judith Steinbook Katzen, and they have three daughters. The couple lives in Coral Gables.

Media Contact: Madeline Baró at 305-348-2234.

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