Rajendra Makkar, MD

Physician, Cardiology
Email:raj.makkar@cshs.org
Phone:(310) 423-3977
Fax:(310) 423-0106

Institute Affiliation

Heart Institute

Academic Appointments

Associate Professor, Medicine

Research Focus

Cell therapy for myocardial repair, percutaneous coronary interventions for left main coronary artery stenosis, percutaneous mitral valve repair, aortic valve repair.

Research Contributions

Principal investigator of REVITALIZE (Randomized Evaluation of Intracoronary Transplantation of Bone Marrow Stem Cells in Myocardial Infarction) pilot study. This is an FDA approved investigator initiated pilot study.
Established left main revascularization registry and initiated a randomized clinical trial.
Involved in helping develop two novel devices to repair mitral valve.

Current investigations include:

Cell therapy for myocardial repair.
Percutaneous coronary intervention for left main coronary artery stenosis.
Percutaneous mitral valve repair using edge-to-edge and coronary sinus approaches.

Selected Publications

  1. Kupferwasser LI, Amorn AM, Kapoor N, Lee MS, Kar S, Cercek B, Dohad S, Mirocha J, Forrester JS, Shah PK, Makkar RR: Comparison of drug-eluting stents with bare metal stents in unselected patients with acute myocardial infarction. Catheterization and cardiovascular interventions : official journal of the Society for Cardiac Angiography & Interventions, 70(1): 1-8, 2007
  2. Lee MS, Jurewitz D, Aragon J, Forrester J, Makkar RR, Kar S: Stent fracture associated with drug-eluting stents: clinical characteristics and implications. Catheterization and cardiovascular interventions : official journal of the Society for Cardiac Angiography & Interventions, 69(3): 387-94, 2007
  3. Lee MS, Jamal F, Kedia G, Chang G, Kapoor N, Forrester J, Czer L, Zimmer R, DeRobertis M, Trento A, Makkar RR: Comparison of bypass surgery with drug-eluting stents for diabetic patients with multivessel disease. Int. J. Cardiol., 123(1): 34-42, 2007
  4. Kupferwasser LI, Lee MS, Schapira JN, Makkar RR: Percutaneous coronary intervention in unprotected left main disease: a status report. Minerva cardioangiologica, 54(5): 633-41, 2006
  5. Forrester JS, Shah PK, Makkar RR: Myocardial regeneration by stem cells: seeing the unseeable. J. Am. Coll. Cardiol., 48(8): 1722-4, 2006
  6. Lee SS, Naqvi TZ, Forrester J, Cattley R, Shah A, Frantzen M, Miyamoto T, Kaufman S, Price MJ, Lill M, Makkar RR: The effect of granulocyte colony stimulating factor on regional and global myocardial function in the porcine infarct model. Int. J. Cardiol., 116(2): 225-30, 2006