Christopher M. Kramer, MD, FACC
ACC President

Christopher M. Kramer, MD, FACC, received his medical degree from the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine, and completed his residency and chief residency in internal medicine, and fellowship in cardiology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. His first faculty appointment was at Allegheny General Hospital, then MCP/Hahnemann University School of Medicine, where he directed the cardiology fellowship.

He then moved to the University of Virginia School of Medicine, where in 2019 he was named the George A. Beller/Lantheus Medical Imaging Distinguished Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine, Chief of the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, and Medical Director of the Heart and Vascular Science Line. Dr. Kramer's principal research interest has been the application of cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) to the cardiovascular system in translational and clinical studies.

Prior to serving as ACC President, Dr. Kramer served as President of the Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance (SCMR), ACC Treasurer, Chair of ACC's Imaging Council, and Chair of the Clinical and Integrative Cardiovascular Sciences NIH study section. Dr. Kramer previously was associate editor at JACC and Executive Editor of JACC: Cardiovascular Imaging. He currently serves on the editorial boards of Circulation, Circulation: Cardiovascular Imaging and Vascular Medicine. Dr. Kramer is also a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, Association of University Cardiologists and American Association of Physicians. He received the Gold Medal from the Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance in 2015 and was named a Distinguished Mentor by the ACC in 2021.

Roxana Mehran, MD, FACC
Vice President

Roxana Mehran, MD, FACC, is an endowed professor of cardiovascular clinical research and outcomes and a professor of medicine (cardiology) and population health science and policy at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Mehran completed fellowships in cardiovascular disease and interventional cardiology at Mount Sinai Medical Center, where she was also named Director of the Women's Heart and Vascular Center at Mount Sinai Fuster Heart Hospital, spearheading a program that represents a collaboration across multiple disciplines designed to meet the unique needs of women's cardiovascular health.

Mehran has served as principal investigator for numerous global studies, developed risk scores for bleeding and acute kidney injury, participated in development of clinical guidelines, and authored more than 2,000 peer-reviewed articles. She is also leading the Lancet Commission on Women's Cardiovascular Diseases. With over 2,300 published manuscripts, Mehran was named by Clarivate Analytics as one of the most influential scientific minds in their Highly Cited Researchers list for the past eight years. She is a founder and Chief Scientific Officer of the Cardiovascular Research Foundation and the founder of Women as One, an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing opportunities for women in medicine.

At the ACC, Mehran has served as Chair of the Interventional Section Leadership Council and has been an author on several revascularization and dual antiplatelet therapy guidelines. She has also been active in the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions, where she served as Program Chair of the 2016 Scientific Sessions and co-founded the Women in Innovations Committee.

Mehran has received several awards, including the 2017 ACC Bernadine Healy Leadership in CV Disease Award and the 2018 Nanette Wenger Award for Excellence in Medical Leadership from WomenHeart: the National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease. In 2019, she received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor. The same year, at the European Society of Cardiology Congress, she was given the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Silver Medal and delivered the ESC Andreas Grüntzig Lecture. In 2022 she was awarded the Terry Ann Krulwich Physician-Scientist Alumni Award, Pulse-Setter Champion Award and Women in Cardiology Mentoring Award from the American Heart Association (AHA). In 2023, she received the Bahr Award of Excellence from the ACC.

Cathleen Biga, MSN, MACC
Immediate-Past President

Cathleen Biga, MSN, MACC, is President and CEO of Cardiovascular Management of Illinois, a cardiology physician practice management company. She has worked with more than 100 cardiovascular providers in the Chicago area and partners in their cardiovascular service lines at more than 14 acute care hospitals. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in nursing from the Mayo/College of St. Teresa and Master of Science in Nursing from Northern Illinois University School of Nursing.

Biga has more than 40 years of experience as a registered nurse, service line director, hospital vice president and CEO. She has 30 years of experience in physician practice management. She has been active nationally in consulting on strategic planning, operational efficiencies, integrated financial and quality initiatives, and growth and development of the cardiovascular service lines.

She is focused on facilitating the integration of strategic, financial and quality perspectives between cardiovascular service lines at practices and hospitals. In addition, she consults and lectures on numerous contemporary cardiovascular topics. Biga is a past member of the American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation Board and was the Inaugural Chair of MedAxiom's Board of Managers.

During her term as ACC President from 2024-2025, Biga led the execution of the first year of ACC's new Strategic Plan, focusing on increasing communication, ensuring members understand the Board's initiatives, demonstrating commitment to quality improvement, and transforming cardiovascular care delivery. Biga also helped advance dyad leadership and team-based care, implementing critical programs and guidelines to empower physician-led teams in adopting guideline-directed medical therapy.

Akshay K. Khandelwal, MD, MBA, FACC
ACC Treasurer
2024-2027

Akshay K. Khandelwal, MD, MBA, FACC, is the System Chair for the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at Allegheny Health Network. He provides strategic and operational oversight for about 90 cardiologists, 60 advanced practice providers and 23 fellows-in-training in an 11-hospital system, embracing a shared-risk model of care.

He obtained his medical degree from Bangalore University in India, and completed residency, a chief residency, a cardiology fellowship, and an interventional cardiology fellowship at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, MI. He completed a master's degree in business administration at the University of Tennessee. Prior to leaving Henry Ford Hospital, he worked as the Associate Medical Director for the Heart and Vascular Service Line, served as a member of the Board of Directors for Mosaic Accountable Care Organization, and chaired the State of Michigan's STEMI Systems of Care Task Force – which resulted in funded legalization to organize STEMI care throughout the state. He is a clinician-educator with an interest in complex percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), STEMI systems of care and critical care cardiology. He has nearly 50 publications in cardiogenic shock, acute coronary syndromes and PCI.

Khandelwal has served various roles at the ACC, including as Chair of the Board of Governors; Secretary of the Board of Trustees; President and Governor, Michigan Chapter; member, Annual Scientific Session Program Committee; Chair, Digital Transformation Task Force; member, Health Equity Task Force; Chair, Investment Subcommittee; and member, Finance Committee. He currently serves as Chair of the Finance Committee as well as Treasurer for the ACC.

David E. Winchester, MD, MS, FACC
Secretary and Board of Governors Chair

David E. Winchester, MD, MS, FACC, is a Professor of Medicine and Radiology at the University of Florida College of Medicine. He is a staff cardiologist at the Malcom Randall VA Medical Center and Senior Medical Adviser for the VA Office of Integrated Veterans Care.

After attending medical school at the University of South Florida, he completed his internal medicine residency at the University of Virginia and cardiology fellowship at the University of Florida.

His other interests include quality improvement, health services research, noninvasive cardiac imaging and appropriateness of care.

Renuka Jain, MD, FACC
Board of Governors Chair-Elect

Renuka Jain, MD, FACC, is an interventional echocardiographer at Aurora St. Luke's Medical Center in Milwaukee, WI. She is the Director of Echocardiography for the Advocate Aurora Health Midwest Region, and is an adjunct Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. She has a deep commitment to echocardiography and interventional echocardiography. Her research interests include valvular heart disease and structural heart interventions.

Jain received her medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. She completed her internal medicine residency at New York Presbyterian Hospital and cardiology fellowship at University of Michigan Hospitals.

She is the current Governor for the Wisconsin Chapter of ACC. She is an associate editor of the Structural Heart Journal and serves on the editorial boards of JACC: Case Reports and the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography.

Lee R. Goldberg, MD, MPH, FACC
Trustee

Lee R. Goldberg, MD, MPH, FACC, is Professor of Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine and serves as Chief of the Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Section in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Additionally, as Vice Chair of Medicine for Informatics, he is responsible for the implementation and optimization of the electronic medical record, coordinating quality and operational data across the Department of Medicine, and spearheading clinician wellness initiatives.

Goldberg earned his medical degree cum laude from Boston University School of Medicine. He completed an internal medicine residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, followed by fellowships in cardiovascular disease and advanced heart failure and transplantation at Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School. He received his Master of Public Health Degree concentrating in Clinical Effectiveness from the Harvard University School of Public Health.

Goldberg's research has focused on heart failure disease management, remote monitoring of heart failure patients, the interplay between sleep and cardiovascular disease, telemedicine innovations, and leveraging large data to improve patient outcomes and clinician effectiveness. He was the Principal Investigator of an AHRQ-sponsored RO1 grant evaluating the impact of different technology models on heart failure disease management and a Co-PI of an NIH-sponsored RO1 grant studying behavioral economics as part of heart failure remote monitoring.

He has served in several roles within the ACC, including past Chair of the Member Section Steering Committee and past Chair of the Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Leadership Council. He is a past member of the Health Information Technology Task Force, Digital Steering Committee, Cardiovascular Management Council, HeartPAC Executive Committee and Lifelong Learning Committee. He currently is serving on the Audit and Compliance Committee and Board of Trustees Task Force on Clinician Well-Being. Additionally, Goldberg is Deputy Editor for the ACC Collaborative Maintenance Pathway for Advanced Heart Failure Evaluative Question Writing Committee.

Bonnie Ky, MD, FACC
Trustee

Bonnie Ky, MD, FACC, is the Founder's Professor of Cardio-Oncology and physician-scientist at the University of Pennsylvania. She leads a highly active NIH- and AHA-funded clinical translational research program in cardio-oncology, with the fundamental goals of advancing actionable science to improve the cardiovascular care of cancer patients.

She is the Director of the Thalheimer Center for Cardio-Oncology, the Founding Director of the Penn Translational Cardio-Oncology Center of Excellence and Director of the Penn Center for Quantitative Echocardiography. She is an invited member of many cardio-oncology expert consensus groups focused on advancing the understanding of cardiovascular disease in the growing cancer population within the NIH, FDA, American Society of Clinical Oncology, ACC, AHA and ESC.

She is a standing member and Chair of the NIH Clinical Integrative Cardiovascular and Hematological Sciences Study Section and the inaugural Chair of the ECOG-ACRIN Cardiotoxicity subcommittee. She is also the inaugural, founding Editor-in-Chief of JACC: Cardio-Oncology; inducted member of both the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians; member of the Sarnoff Research Committee; and recipient of both the International Cardio-Oncology Society Thomas Force Leadership Award and ECOG-ACRIN Young Investigator Award.

Sandra J. Lewis, MD, FACC
Trustee

Sandra J. Lewis, MD, FACC, practices cardiology at Legacy Health in Portland, Oregon, where she previously led a multispecialty cardiology group for 25 years. She is past Governor of the Oregon Chapter of the ACC, past Chair of the ACC Section Steering Committee, past Chair of the ACC HeartPAC, past Chair of the Women in Cardiology Section of the ACC, past Chair of the ACC Ethics and Compliance Committee, and member of the Health Affairs Committee. Additionally, recognizing the untapped potential for mid-career women cardiologists to develop leadership skills, she initiated the SJL Mid-Career Women's Leadership Institute.

She is a graduate of Stanford University School of Medicine, where she completed her internship, residency and cardiology training. She was a recipient in the inaugural year of the ACC Merck Research Fellowship.

Lewis was an investigator in landmark clinical trials, including SAVE, PROVE-IT, TNT, Jupiter and the CARE trial, where she authored or co-authored multiple subgroup analyses. She authored the third ACC Professional Life Survey, co-authored papers on Sex Differences in Ischemic Heart Disease, The Pregnant Cardiologist, Building Heart Centers for Women, and Career Preferences and Perceptions of Cardiology Among US Internal Medicine Trainees. She was named by Good Housekeeping as one of the 44 top cardiac doctors for women and has been recognized over many years on Castle and Connolly's "America's Top Doctors" list.

Thomas M. Maddox, MD, MSc, FACC
Trustee

Thomas M. Maddox, MD, MSc, FACC, is Vice President, Digital Products and Innovation, at BJCHealthCare at the Washington University School of Medicine. He is also Professor of Medicine (Cardiology) at Washington University School of Medicine. Maddox earned his undergraduate degree from Rice University, his master's in epidemiology from Harvard University and his medical degree from Emory University School of Medicine. He completed his residency at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and cardiology fellowship at Mount Sinai Medical Center in NYC.

Prior to his present roles, Maddox was National Director of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) CART program, a quality and safety program for VA cardiac catheterization laboratories. He was also on faculty at University of Colorado Medicine.

Maddox is well known for his contributions to digital transformation, health care delivery innovation, health care learning systems, and health services research in cardiac quality and safety. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine's Digital Health Action Collaborative and the Healthcare Innovators Professional Society. He has published over 250 peer-reviewed publications and received multiple grants supporting his work.

Andreas Merkl, MBA
Trustee

Andreas Merkl, MBA, is the CEO and co-founder of Centigrade, a data company focused on global carbon and nature credit markets. He is also a research fellow at Oxford University. Most of his life's work has centered on complex systems problems on the human/ecology interface, including climate, oceans, circular economy/plastic, food systems and natural resource management. Merkl holds a Master's degree in Business Administration from Harvard University, a Master's degree in City and Regional Planning from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Bachelor's degree from the University of California, Santa Cruz in Natural History and Environmental Studies.

Merkl learned politics working for Diane Feinstein in San Francisco, CA. He spent the better part of a decade with McKinsey & Coin banking and natural resources. From 2000 through 2013, he grew CEA, a San Francisco-based consulting and investment platform, into an incubator of environmental foundations. He has also held senior management or governance roles at an international treaty-based organization (Global Green Growth Institute), venture capital funds (e.g. SeaChange Fund), industry associations (e.g. Chemical Recycling Partnership), a fiscal sponsorship organization (e.g. The Canopy Institute, now Multiplier) and non-profits (e.g. Community Conservation Investment Forum). From 2013 through 2018, Andreas was the CEO of the Ocean Conservancy.

Most recently, Merkl was the lead author on the High-Level Panel on Sustainable Ocean Economies Report, worked with a major global investor on reshaping global plastics recycling markets and served as a principal in the Finance for Biodiversity initiative. He has a long-term collaboration with Oxford University on quantitative assessments of the dynamics between complex ecological systems, their users and the polices that govern them. He chairs Sustain our Urban Landscape (SOUL), a non-profit focused on the reforestation of New Orleans, LA.

Pamela B. Morris, MD, FACC
Trustee

Pamela B. Morris, MD, FACC, is Professor of Medicine in Cardiology, the Paul V. Kramer Chair of Cardiovascular Disease Prevention, and Director of the Seinsheimer Cardiovascular Health Program at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) in Charleston, SC. She completed her internal medicine and cardiovascular training at Duke Medical Center, where she also served as Medical Director of the Duke Center for Living/Duke University's Preventative Approach to Cardiology. She was faculty at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, in the Cardiovascular Health Program for six years before joining MUSC in 2005.

Morris has a career-long focus on all aspects of cardiovascular disease prevention. She is well-recognized as an important contributor to clinical guidance in the field of preventive cardiology and has participated as co-author of multiple ACC Expert Consensus Decision Pathways. She served as Vice Chair of ACC.19 and ACC.20 and Chair of ACC.21 and ACC.22. She has received several awards, including the Inaugural ACC Excellence in Leadership Award for her role in developing the Heart House Roundtable consensus methodology in 2017, as well as the Clinician Educator Award from the National Lipid Association in 2020. In 2023, Morris received the ACC Distinguished Service Award. In addition to serving on the ACC International Program Planning committees, she has been instrumental in developing ACC's cascading train-the-trainer programs in preventive cardiology, reaching thousands of clinicians in many different countries.

Prior to her role as a trustee of ACC, Morris served in leadership positions at the National Lipid Association, the American Society of Preventive Cardiology, the American Board of Clinical Lipidology and the Certification Board of the Society of Cardiac Computed Tomography. Her commitment in service to the ACC has included additional important roles, such as Inaugural Chair of the Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease Leadership Council, co-founder and Chair of ACC's Heart House Roundtable methodology, co-author of methodology for ACC Expert Consensus Decision Pathways, and an associate editor of JACC.

Hani Najm, MD, MSc, FACC
Trustee

Hani Najm, MD, MSc, FACC, is an expert in congenital heart surgery and has performed more than 10,000 surgical cases on newborns, children and adults with complex heart disease. He attended medical school at King Saud University in Saudi Arabia and completed training at the Toronto Hospital and the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada.

Najm spent 17 years developing the premier pediatric and adult heart program at King Abdulaziz Medical Center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, before joining the Cleveland Clinic in 2016 as Chair of Pediatric and Adult Congenital Heart Surgery. Najm is world-renowned for innovative surgical techniques that have improved the outcomes of patients with congenital heart disease. Additionally, he has patented a valve prothesis that grows with newborns and infants.

Najm is a past president of the Saudi Heart Association and served as the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Saudi Heart Association, a member of the Saudi Medical Journal editorial board and an associate professor at King Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. He holds numerous memberships in national and international professional organizations.

Samuel O. Jones, MD, MPH, FACC
Trustee

Samuel O. Jones, MD, MPH, FACC, works as Director of Inpatient Electrophysiology at the Memorial Hospital for Chattanooga Heart Institute. He is Past Chair for the Health Affairs Committee for the ACC and previously served as Co-Lead for the electrophysiology service line for the CommonSpirit Hospital System. In addition to his ACC BOT role, Jones serves on the Board of Trustees for the Chattanooga Medical Society.

He is board-certified in Cardiovascular Diseases and Clinical Cardiac Electrophysiology and is an FACC, as well as a fellow of the Heart Rhythm Society. He retired as a Colonel from the United States Air Force from San Antonio Military Medical Center in 2017, where he was Associate Professor of Medicine for the Uniformed Service University of the Health Sciences and served as faculty for the cardiology fellowship for 10 years.

Jones completed his fellowship in Clinical Cardiac Electrophysiology from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston while earning a Master's degree in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health. He completed a fellowship in Cardiovascular Disease at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. Jones earned his medical degree from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and an undergraduate degree from the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, CO.

Jones had a distinguished military career, where he served as both the Cardiology Consultant and Chief Consultant of Internal Medicine Services to the Air Force Surgeon General. He served as an F-15 flight surgeon while based at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida and spent time both deployed and on manning assists. His professional interest has centered around Sports Cardiology and sudden cardiac death. He has remained active in the ACC, chairing the Federal Cardiology section and serving on the NCDR Oversight Committee, Board of Governors from 2012-2015, and Tennessee State Chapter Council from 2018 to present.

Geoffrey A. Rose, MD, FACC
Trustee

Geoffrey A. Rose, MD, FACC, is the Jerome & Rosalind Richardson Endowed Chair in Cardiovascular Medicine and Professor of Medicine at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and serves as President, Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute and as Heart & Vascular Service Line Leader, Advocate Health Southeast Region.

Recognized as a Fellow of both the ACC and the American Society of Echocardiography (ASE), Rose served as Program Chair for the ASE 2017 National Scientific Sessions. A former member of ASE Board of Directors, he presently serves as ASE representative to the AMA RVS Update Committee. Rose is the former President of the Intersocietal Accreditation Commission. Focused on identifying and implementing best operational practices, he serves as Course Co-Director for the ACC Cardiovascular Summit. He also chairs the Partners in Quality Subcommittee for the ACC and is an inaugural member of the Board of Managers for ACC MedAxiom.

Rose is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, where he completed his residency in Internal Medicine (Chief Resident) at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He received his training in cardiovascular disease at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he completed an additional research fellowship in echocardiography.