Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery

Patient Care

UT Southwestern Medical Center is one of the nation’s leading centers for cardiac and thoracic surgery.

  • Our Clinical Heart Transplantation program has performed more than 800 heart transplants since our inception in April 1988.
    • Our one-year, five-year, and 10-year survival rates are the best in Texas.
    • Since 1990, our Lung Transplant Program has performed more than 1,000 lung transplants.
      • Over the last 10 years, actuarial survival rates for the program have consistently exceeded the national average.
      • We have seen an increase in the use of ventricular assist devices for a broad range of both short- and long-term needs of patients with end-stage heart failure.
      • Our clinical volume of general thoracic surgery continues to steadily increase, with lung, esophageal, mediastinal, and other chest cases performed.

Residents and fellows are actively involved in patient care, helping us provide an advanced level of round-the-clock care and state-of-the-art surgical therapies, including:

Cardiac Surgical Procedures

  • Complex aortic procedures, including endovascular stents
  • Complex electrophysiology/device procedures
  • Adult congenital heart surgery
  • High-risk coronary artery bypass graft surgery
  • Off-pump coronary artery bypass graft surgery
  • Surgical treatments for atrial fibrillation
  • Traditional and minimally invasive heart valve surgery
  • Valve sparing root replacement
  • Ventricular remodeling procedures

 Thoracic Surgical Procedures

  • Endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS)
  • Extrapleural pneumonectomy
  • Interventional airway, laser, and stent procedures
  • Video-assisted thoracic surgery (VATS)
  • Thoracic surgery for malignancies
  • Lung volume reduction
  • Thoracoscopic sympathectomy for hyperhydrosis
  • Robot-assisted thoracic surgery

Esophageal Surgical Procedures

  • Complete staging of esophageal malignancies
  • Minimally invasive esophageal procedures
  • Laser ablation and stenting of advanced esophageal cancers
  • Thoracoscopic esophagectomy

Transplant

  • Heart, lung, and heart-lung transplantation
  • Ventricular assist devices

UT Southwestern residents and fellows are actively involved in patient care.