Dr. Anas Safadi, an Interventional Cardiologist at St. Mary Medical Center in Hobart, is a Northwest Indiana native and a part of a multidisciplinary team of physicians and healthcare personnel that works to determine the best treatment options to meet the specific needs of patients suffering from non-healing wounds or pain in the lower extremities. Safadi is the medical director of the hospital’s Limb Ischemia & Vascular Excellence (LIVE) program. The LIVE program diagnoses, treats, educates and rehabilitates patients to help them toward recovery.
“Peripheral vascular disease is a very common entity that a lot of the mainstream public is really unaware of,” Dr. Safadi said. “One out of three patients who are above 70, or one out of three above 50 who have diabetes or a history of smoking, have peripheral vascular disease. We hear about campaigns for breast cancer, lung cancer or heart disease, which are very important, but, if you look at peripheral vascular disease, the risks are so much more impactful and yet the general public doesn’t know much about it.”
In speaking about the specifics of the LIVE program, Dr. Safadi said, “since there’s such a need for this, we really wanted to form a program whereby we were able to provide patients a full array of services that provides the highest quality of care possible for them. We designed a multidisciplinary program which includes interventional cardiology, podiatry, infectious disease, a wound care team, endocrinologists and vascular surgeons.”
“We can take a look at a patient from a team approach and provide them all of the services that would help them prevent any more dangerous disease processes. If they already have it, we help treat these patients and heal the areas in a successful model that is based on what we call evidence-based medicine, providing the most up-to-date services for these patients so they get the best possible care.”
Dr. Safadi attended Indiana University for all his training in Internal Medicine, General Cardiology and Interventional Cardiology. Dr. Safadi completed his residency at I.U. Medical Center, his internship at I.U. Hospitals, and a fellowship at the I.U. School of Medicine in Interventional Cardiology.
Interventional Cardiology is a specialty of cardiology that deals with interventions like coronary stenting, peripheral vascular disease intervention and more specialized, high risk procedures related to cardiology.
Dr. Safadi knew well before attending Indiana University what type of medicine he was going to practice.
“Believe it or not, I was interested in cardiology starting in middle school,” Dr. Safadi said. “I saw a procedure when I was young while shadowing a physician. I was interested in medicine, and that really triggered my interest.”
“After that, I learned about the heart, physiology and anatomy,” said Dr. Safadi. “Cardiology, particularly interventional cardiology, is a field that encompasses a lot of different areas of medicine. You can do procedures but you also have exposure to the inpatient side, imaging and other types of modalities like echocardiography and nuclear cardiology.”
“It was kind of the best of both worlds,” Dr. Safadi said of interventional cardiology. “Whereas a surgeon does mainly procedures and an internal medicine doctor mainly does clinic and rounding, this touched all those areas together, which really sparked my interest.”
Having grown up in Northwest Indiana, Dr. Safadi knew that he would be looking to practice in the region after completing his training, and Community Healthcare System afforded him the opportunity for which he was looking.
“There was no question that it was a great opportunity,” said Dr. Safadi. “St. Mary Medical Center, and the Community Healthcare System as a whole, is very physician friendly and very supportive of us. They allow us to expand in regards to doing new procedures and bringing in new technology. It was a no-brainer for me.”
To learn more about the LIVE program at St. Mary Medical Center, call 219-703-5483 (LIVE) or visit comhs.org.
