A newly identified genetic risk factor for heart block after surgery may help guide the course of postoperative care.

Scott Baldwin, M.D., director of the Division of Pediatric Cardiology, recently was awarded the American Heart Association’s Helen B. Taussig Memorial Lecture, considered one of the most renowned invited lectures in the United States.

In her office, Ann Kavanaugh-McHugh, M.D., reaches up to a high shelf and pulls down a stack of notebooks. Reminders, she says, of the 4,000 families she has cared for over the course of her nearly 25-year career as a pediatric cardiologist at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt.

A “profile” of the genes and regulatory networks that govern early heart valve development lay the groundwork for generating valves from a patient’s own cells.

An unexpected group of cells generates the coronary arteries and may be useful for regeneration therapies following injury to the heart.

Identification of a gene that is involved in the development of heart valves offers new insights into congenital heart valve disease.