Genomics and the cardiac surgeon.
Until recently, genetics was a course relegated to Saturdays in medical school, and molecular biology was a subject you could only discuss while smoking a pipe. Now, some gene polymorphisms may predict perioperative trouble more precisely than a 10% ejection fraction. Gene chips will soon permit designer therapy and a micro-array "signature" will soon become fundamental to pre-operative risk stratification. It is time for the cardiac surgical community to come aboard.
Bullard
Miriam Kelley
MK
UCSF East Bay, Department of Surgery, Oakland, California 94602, USA. bullardk@surgery.ucsf.edu
Swift
Mini
M
Harken
Alden
A
D002309:Cardiology; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000235:genetics*; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D023281:Genomics; D006801:Humans