Senior Clinical Advisor

Dr. Philip Sager is a cardiac electrophysiologist with an extensive career spanning academia, drug development, and regulatory policy. He was a tenured faculty member at the UCLA School of Medicine and currently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine. 

Dr. Sager has held senior leadership roles in the pharmaceutical industry, including Vice President of CV/Metabolic Development at Gilead Sciences and Executive Director at AstraZeneca. In these roles, he led the development of several major drugs, including Zetia, Vytorin, Crestor, Letairis, and Brilinta, and contributed to multiple NDAs and sNDAs. He also served on the Board of Directors of Anthera, Inc., a public biotechnology company, and is a co-founder of Thryv Therapeutics. 

Dr. Sager is a past chair of the FDA Cardiovascular and Renal Drugs Advisory Committee and a Founding Member and Executive Committee member of the FDA-Sponsored Cardiac Safety Research Consortium. He has played a significant international leadership role in cardiovascular safety issues in drug development and public health policy and served as the ICH E14 (the "QT Guidance") PhRMA Expert Working Group Topic Leader. 

Dr. Sager holds an M.D. from Yale University School of Medicine and B.S. degrees in Biology and Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He completed his training in internal medicine, cardiology, and cardiac electrophysiology at Yale School of Medicine. Dr. Sager has authored more than 200 original manuscripts and abstracts. 

LQTS Advisor

Dr. Dominic Abrams is the Co-Director of the Center for Cardiovascular Genetics at Boston Children’s Hospital, where he leads a program providing comprehensive clinical care and translational research for a wide range of cardiovascular genetic disorders. He is also a member of the Cardiovascular Genetic Program at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and serves as an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School. 

Dr. Abrams' research focuses on inherited arrhythmia syndromes and arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathies, with a particular emphasis on developing novel therapies that target underlying genetic abnormalities. His work also explores the mechanisms of variant penetrance, seeking to improve the understanding of how genetic variations influence disease expression and patient outcomes. 

Dr. Abrams trained in both pediatric and adult cardiology at The Royal Brompton, University College, and St. Bartholomew’s Hospitals in London. He later served on the faculty at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital as an adult interventional cardiologist and electrophysiologist. He holds a research doctorate from the University of London and an MBA from the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). 

LQTS Advisor

Dr. Michael Ackerman is a Professor of Medicine, Pediatrics, and Molecular Pharmacology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He serves as the Director of the Long QT Syndrome/Inherited Arrhythmia Clinic and the Sudden Death Genomics Laboratory at the Mayo Clinic, where he leads pioneering research and patient care for inherited arrhythmia syndromes. 

Dr. Ackerman has dedicated his career to advancing the understanding and treatment of cardiac channelopathies. Since 2006, he has served as President of the Sudden Arrhythmia Death Syndromes (SADS) Foundation, where he has played a key role in raising awareness of inherited arrhythmias and supporting families affected by conditions such as Long QT Syndrome (LQTS). 

After graduating from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, Dr. Ackerman earned his MD and PhD from the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He completed his residency in Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, followed by a fellowship in Pediatric Cardiology and postdoctoral training in Molecular Genetics at the Mayo Graduate School of Medicine. He joined the Mayo Clinic faculty in 2000 and has since become a leading expert in sudden infant death syndrome, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and congenital long QT syndrome. 

Dr. Ackerman’s research and clinical expertise have made a significant impact on the diagnosis, management, and prevention of life-threatening arrhythmias, positioning him as a key figure in the field of inherited cardiovascular disorders. 

Atrial Fibrillation Advisor

Dr. Paul Dorian is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Cardiology and the Division of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Toronto. He is a Staff Cardiac Electrophysiologist at St. Michael’s Hospital and a Staff Scientist at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute. With over 500 peer-reviewed publications, Dr. Dorian is a recognized leader in the fields of cardiac electrophysiology, arrhythmia care, and sports cardiology. 

Dr. Dorian was the Director of the Division of Cardiology at the University of Toronto from 2009 to 2019 and served as President of the Canadian Heart Rhythm Society from 2013 to 2014. He has been instrumental in advancing arrhythmia research, having served on the steering committees of multiple multicenter clinical trials. He was the principal investigator for the ALIVE RCT of antiarrhythmic drugs in cardiac arrest, the Family study on predicting and preventing sudden cardiac death, the CIHR-funded EpiDOSE Trial, and the Program to Reduce Sudden Death funded by the Canadian Arrhythmia Network. 

His research has focused on the mechanisms of ventricular fibrillation, treatment of experimental cardiac arrest, and improving outcomes in cardiopulmonary resuscitation. He has also led key research initiatives to optimize care for patients with atrial fibrillation (AF), including assessing patient-reported outcomes and quality of life. Dr. Dorian designed and implemented the CCS-SAF score, the AFSS scale, and the AFEQT scale — now widely used to measure quality of life in AF patients. 

As a core participant in the University of Toronto Sports Cardiology Program, Dr. Dorian has led studies on the incidence and causes of sudden death in competitive sports and the diagnostic accuracy of ECG in athlete screening. He has contributed to several Canadian Cardiovascular Society guidelines on atrial fibrillation, heart failure, ventricular arrhythmia, and athlete preparticipation screening. 

Dr. Dorian earned his medical degree from McGill University in 1976. He completed training in Internal Medicine, Clinical Pharmacology, and Cardiology at the University of Toronto, followed by a Fellowship in Cardiac Electrophysiology at Stanford University. He is an Associate Editor of Electrophysiological Disorders of the Heart and a recipient of the University of Toronto Department of Medicine Research Award and the Achievement Awards from the Canadian Cardiovascular Society and the Canadian Heart Rhythm Society. 

Atrial Fibrillation Advisor

Dr. Roger Damle is a highly experienced cardiologist and electrophysiologist with over 30 years of clinical and research expertise in cardiac arrhythmias. He earned both his Bachelor of Science and Doctor of Medicine degrees from Northwestern University. Dr. Damle completed his Internal Medicine internship and residency at Beth Israel Hospital/Harvard Medical School before returning to Northwestern for fellowships in Cardiology and Cardiac Electrophysiology. 

In 1993, Dr. Damle joined the faculty at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center, where he played a key role in developing the ablation and device implantation programs. His research during this time focused on the underlying mechanisms of ventricular and supraventricular arrhythmias, as well as drug and device therapies for ventricular arrhythmias. 

Since 1997, Dr. Damle has been practicing at South Denver Cardiology Associates, where he maintains a full-time clinical electrophysiology practice. He has also contributed to numerous clinical trials on antiarrhythmic and device therapy, as well as antithrombotic treatments for atrial fibrillation. 

LQTS Advisor

Dr. Stanley Nattel received his MD from McGill University in 1974 and completed his training in Internal Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology at McGill between 1974 and 1978. He then obtained clinical and basic research training in Cardiology at Indiana University and the University of Pennsylvania from 1978 to 1981 before joining the faculty at McGill University in 1981. 

In 1987, Dr. Nattel transferred to the University of Montreal and the Montreal Heart Institute, where he directed the Research Center from 1990 to 2004. He currently holds the Paul-David Chair in Cardiovascular Electrophysiology at the University of Montreal and serves as Director of the Electrophysiology Research Program at the Montreal Heart Institute, where he continues to practice clinical cardiology. 

Dr. Nattel is the Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Journal of Cardiology, Associate Editor of Heart Rhythm, and serves on the editorial boards of Journal of Physiology, Circulation Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology, Circulation Research, Cardiovascular Research, Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology, Journal of Cardiovascular Pharmacology, Nature Reviews in Cardiology, and Drugs. 

His research focuses on clinically relevant mechanisms of cardiac bioelectricity, particularly in atrial fibrillation, proarrhythmia, cardiac remodeling, ion channel molecular physiology, and mechanisms of drug action. Dr. Nattel’s laboratory employs molecular, cellular, whole-animal, and theoretical methods to uncover basic mechanisms and identify novel therapeutic targets, particularly for atrial fibrillation. 

Dr. Nattel has authored over 400 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the Royal College of Physicians of Canada, the American College of Cardiology, and the Heart Rhythm Society. 

LQTS Advisor

Dr. Marco Perez is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine, where he serves as Director of the Stanford Inherited Arrhythmia Clinic, Director of the Stanford Electrocardiography Laboratory, and Faculty Associate Director of the Stanford Center for Cardiovascular Diseases. 

Dr. Perez earned his undergraduate and medical degrees from Harvard University before completing his internal medicine residency at Massachusetts General Hospital. He then moved to Stanford University, where he completed fellowships in Cardiology and Electrophysiology. In 2010, he founded the Stanford Inherited Arrhythmia Clinic and has since been managing families with inherited arrhythmic conditions. His research focuses on the epidemiology and genetics of inherited arrhythmias, including Long QT Syndrome (LQTS), catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia (CPVT), and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, as well as early-onset atrial fibrillation. He has also used bioinformatics to identify genomic therapeutic targets for heart failure. 

Dr. Perez has led multiple high-impact research studies, including the NIH/NHLBI-funded WHISH STAR study, which examined the effects of exercise on cardiac arrhythmias in the elderly. He was co-PI of the groundbreaking Apple Heart Study, which tested wearable algorithms to detect atrial fibrillation. Currently, he serves as PI of the Clinical Coordinating Center for the REACT-AF trial, which explores the use of wearable devices to guide anticoagulant therapy in patients with atrial fibrillation. His laboratory also applies machine learning tools to assess cardiovascular disease risk. 

Dr. Perez’s work is supported by funding from the NIH/NHLBI, Apple Inc., Janssen, and the Colson Foundation. 

LQTS Advisor

Dr. Arthur Wilde is an internationally recognized expert in inherited arrhythmia syndromes and sudden cardiac death, with over 550 published scientific papers. He earned his MD from the University of Amsterdam in 1983 and completed his PhD in 1988. Dr. Wilde trained in Cardiology at the Academic Medical Centre, where he became a registered cardiologist in 1994. He then specialized in clinical electrophysiology at the Academic Hospital Utrecht. 

In 1999, Dr. Wilde was appointed head of the Laboratory of Experimental Cardiology at the Academic Medical Centre, and in 2003, he became head of the Department of Clinical and Experimental Cardiology. His research has focused on the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying inherited arrhythmia syndromes, as well as the genetic factors contributing to sudden cardiac death in the general population. 

Dr. Wilde's contributions to the field have been widely recognized. He was appointed as a member of the Dutch Academy of Science in 2011 and received the HRS Distinguished Investigator Award in 2012.