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Jacob Dal-Bianco, MD

Dr. Dal-Bianco's focus is on the evaluation and management of patients with cardiovascular disease, with clinical expertise in heart valve disease and special interest in mitral valve disease. His research is focused on the mitral valve.

  • Phone: 617-724-2076
Departments
Cardiology
Department of Medicine

Specialties

  • Heart Center
  • Heart Valve Program
Clinical Interests
Valvular heart disease
Mitral valve
Mitral valve regurgitation
Mitral valve prolapse
Aortic valve
Aortic stenosis
Rheumatic heart disease
Catheter-based heart valve repair
Echocardiography, Cardiac ultrasound
Locations
Boston: Massachusetts General Hospital
Medical Education
MD, University of Vienna
Residency, Mayo Clinic
Fellowship, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Fellowship, Massachusetts General Hospital
Board Certifications
Internal Medicine, American Board of Internal Medicine
Cardiovascular Disease, American Board of Internal Medicine
Gender
Male
Foreign Languages
German
Patient Age Group
Adult
Accepting New Patients
Yes

Biography

Jacob Dal-Bianco, MD, is a graduate of the University of Vienna Medical School, Austria. He completed his residency in Internal Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, followed by fellowships in Echocardiography and Cardiovascular Diseases at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, CA. He joined the staff of the Mass General Hospital in 2013 as a faculty member of the Cardiology Division and Heart Valve Program. Dr. Dal-Bianco's work has been recognized by a Career Development Award from the American Society of Echocardiography, by his selection for Young Investigator Award presentations of the American Heart Association and American Society of Echocardiography and by the Stanford Calderwood Prize for postdoctoral fellow research from the Mass General Hospital.

Dr. Dal-Bianco's main clinical focus is on the evaluation and management of patients with heart valve disease, with a special interest and expertise in mitral valve disease. This includes patients with mitral valve prolapse, mitral stenosis (a mitral valve that cannot open enough) and mitral regurgitation (a leaky mitral valve). Mitral regurgitation, also called mitral insufficiency or mitral incompetence, is common. When the mitral valve doesn't seal tightly, blood will flow backward in the heart, instead of forward. Patient symptoms can include shortness of breath, fatigue, palpitations and swollen feet or ankles. Dr. Dal-Bianco works closely with members of the cardiac catheterization laboratory, using advanced cardiac ultrasound techniques to guide the catheter based repair of diseased heart valves through a small incision in the groin or between the ribs. Please follow this link to the MGH Heart Valve Program.

Research

Dr. Dal-Bianco's research aims to understand the mechanism of how the mitral valve, a valve that separates the left heart chambers, adapts to myocardial injury following a heart attack. One of the major complications following a heart attack is mitral regurgitation (mitral valve leakage) due to incomplete and impaired leaflet closure. Mitral regurgitation is also called mitral incompetence or insufficiency.

When the mitral valve doesn't seal tightly, blood will flow backward in the heart, instead of forward. This leads to lung congestion, enlargement of the heart and contributes to the doubling of mortality. Patients experience heart failure and report of shortness of breath, fatigue and / or swollen feet and ankles.

Dr. Dal-Bianco explores the adaptive mechanisms of the mitral valve following a heart attack and his research suggests that mitral valve leaflets actively grow and adapt. This novel observation contradicts the notion of mitral valve leaflets being merely passive tissue flaps.

Understanding the mechanisms of active mitral valve adaptation can potentially provide therapeutic opportunities to augment leaflet area: Larger mitral leaflets should restore adequate leaflet closure and therefore reduce the amount of mitral regurgitation and improve heart failure symptoms. This multidisciplinary research project is coordinated and spearheaded by Dr. Robert Levine, Dr. Elena Aikawa and Dr. Joyce Bischoff.

Publications

View my most recent publications at PubMed

Please see a list of Dr. Dal-Bianco's publications by clicking on the link above

Cardiac Unit Associates
55 Fruit Street
Yawkey Center for Outpatient Care, Suite 5B
Boston, MA 02114-2696

Phone: 617-724-2076
Fax: 617-643-3963

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