Professor Béla Merkely, MD, PhD
Hungarian interventional cardiologist and sport cardiologist, Rector of Semmelweis University, Chairman and Director of Semmelweis University’s Heart and Vascular Centre
Professor Merkely has been the Rector of Semmelweis University since 2018 and Chairman and Director of Semmelweis University’s Heart and Vascular Centre since 2007. He focuses on non-pharmacological heart failure treatment, interventional cardiology techniques, cardiac imaging, arrhythmias, acute coronary syndromes, and sports cardiology, including elite athlete heart remodeling. He pioneered and advanced several minimally invasive, endovascular, catheter-based interventions. Under his leadership, the Városmajor Heart and Vascular Centre became internationally recognized and a leading training center. He is a member of nearly all major national and international scientific societies related to cardiology, arythmias and pacemakers, interventional cardiology, circulatory research. He has authored 1088 international publications with more than 51,900 citations and an impact factor of 7800 indexed in major bibliometric databases.