Intervention day 1: Calcium modification in PCI

Dr O’Kane graduated from Charing Cross & Westminster Medical School in 1995 with First Class Honours Bachelor of Science BSc degree in Physiology, Medical Degree MBBS and numerous prizes including the Llewelyn Prize for the second-best distinction in medical finals. After attaining membership of the Royal College of Physicians MRCP he was subsequently awarded a Doctorate of Medicine MD by the University of London for a thesis on the role of nitric oxide in coronary heart disease.

Dr O’Kane was appointed as Consultant Interventional Cardiologist at the Royal Bournemouth Hospital in July 2007. Working in the UKs highest volume non-surgical PCI centre he has performed over 6000 PCI procedures as a Consultant operator, and so is one of the highest volume UK operators. He routinely treats extensively calcified lesions, bifurcations including left main stem disease & chronic total occlusions.

He is committed to teaching & education with local fellowship training program through to national & international proctorship of techniques & multiple adjunctive devices eg Rotational & laser atherectomy. Consequently, he has trained Consultant colleagues from the UK, Europe, Asia & US. He is regularly invited as faculty to National & International meetings as a presenter & live case operator. 

He has published over 50 manuscripts in the last 20 years including original work, international collaboration & case studies. He has authored 10 book chapters particularly related to Laser atherectomy. He is a local principal Investigator for 29 National & International multi-centre clinical trials & is dedicated to patient recruitment to studies. 

Within the Directorate Cardiology Directorate he has led numerous quality improvement programs & has achieved Local Clinical Excellence Award level 7. He is a nationally elected member to British Cardiovascular Intervention Society (BCIS) Council & Wessex Cardiology representative for the Royal College of Physicians.

Prof Perera graduated in medicine from Cambridge University and completed his early clinical training at Addenbrooke’s, Papworth and West Suffolk hospitals.
He undertook specialist training in cardiology in south London and sub-speciality training in interventional cardiology at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust and Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals.

In 2008, he received a senior lectureship award from the Department of Health, Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and the UK Clinical Research Collaboration (UKCRC). He was also appointed to the post of consultant cardiologist at Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital. He was promoted to reader in interventional cardiology in 2013 and to professor of cardiology in 2017.
In addition to his clinical and research roles, he teaches undergraduate medical students and supervises postgraduate researchers towards MSc, MD and PhD degrees at King’s College London.

Dr Johnson is fully trained in percutaneous coronary intervention and all aspects of general cardiology including hypertension, cardiovascular risk assessment, valvular heart disease, heart failure and arrhythmia.

He qualified from St Mary's Hospital (Imperial College, London) in 1998 and prior to commencing specialist training in the South West he undertook a period of research studying novel treatment strategies to prevent re-narrowing of stented coronaries and bypass grafts, culminating in the award of an MD. Additionally, he spent one year as Interventional Fellow at the world renowned Greenlane Cardiovascular Unit in New Zealand.

Dr Johnson has an active involvement within the NIHR Biomedical Research Unit at the Bristol Heart Institute as a principal investigator for two ongoing projects (PINPOINT-PPCI & ERUPT-MI), investigating patients suffering acute ST elevation MI. In addition, He was awarded a £100k research grant from Heart Research UK, in 2012, to develop the plaque characterisation capabilities of optical coherence tomography, an intravascular imaging tool.

Dr Kalpa De Silva has been a consultant interventional cardiologist at Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust since 2020. Previously he was a consultant interventional cardiologist at the Bristol Heart Institute, University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust. He specialises in the management of coronary artery disease, looking after patients with chest pain, angina and those who have suffered heart attacks.