Dr. Spencer B. King III
The History of PTCA
Dr. Spencer B. King III (USA) is a Professor of Medicine Emeritus at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1980, he recruited Dr. Andreas Gruentzig to establish Emory’s interventional cardiology program, which became a global leader through live demonstration courses and groundbreaking clinical trials that advanced PTCA into mainstream practice. With over 600 published papers and 10 co-edited books, including Interventional Cardiology and multiple editions of Hurst’s The Heart, his contributions to cardiology are immense. Recognized with the TCT Career Achievement Award (2009), the ETHICA Award, and the “Master of the Masters” Award at TCTAP (2015), his impact on the field is profound. One memory I cherish is from our very first meeting when I thanked him for traveling such a long distance to attend. With humility, he mentioned learning a great deal about left main stenting, which he couldn’t observe in the U.S. Since then, he has rarely missed our meetings. Spencer is truly someone we hold in the highest regard and remain deeply grateful for.
Spencer has been a driving force in invasive cardiology and interventional cardiology, and all aspects of cardiology. He has been a president of American Cardiology. He was head of the Interventional Cardiology Board Examination Writing Committee that I served with him on. He was in editor of JACC Intervention. So he has done it all. He has been a huge individual in the field. He has been incredibly productive. He is prolific in terms of giving talks, in terms of relating to people. But number one, he was incredibly involved with the American Cardiology. Number two, he was incredibly involved with the people around him, with his family around him. Number three, that really identifies multiple facets of Spencer B. King III. A great individual, a tireless worker in the field of interventional cardiology, in the field of education, in the field of science, in the field of research. A tremendous individual and tremendous friend. (David R. Holmes)
You’re the inventor of the multi-purpose catheter, and you kind of arm-twisted your fellows among them myself, to practice this multi-purpose catheter rather than using them more easy Judkins coronary catheter. This tremendously helped us to manipulate catheters in Sinus of Valsalva and this became particularly important when it came to manipulate guiding catheters for PCI. (Bernhard Meier) Spencer has been a special mentor to me. Obviously, we all know that Spencer is a giant in coronary angioplasty and has taught hundreds of thousands of interventionalists throughout the world. I was fortunate enough to succeed Spencer as the second chair of this committee. And I applied what I learned from Spencer, in really trying to achieve balance and achieve consensus and really sort of learned from how Spencer could run this committee and tried to apply to my role. (Alan C. Yeung)
I really thank you for all that you’ve done for interventional cardiology, from being there at the beginning, to helping us make this to the subspecialty. You’ve really truly served as a global ambassador for interventional cardiology around the world. You meant so much to me personally in terms of being a role model and really an inspiration for everything I’ve tried to accomplish. (Gregg W. Stone) For me, Spencer is responsible to the academic knowledge, to the clinical training. And also as a mentor, he taught me how to bring that, move that to the next generation, so that his legacy will always continue through the generation that I had fortunate to train. (Ron Waksman)
Dr. Spencer B. King III (USA) is a Professor of Medicine Emeritus at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1980, he recruited Dr. Andreas Gruentzig to establish Emory’s interventional cardiology program, which became a global leader through live demonstration courses and groundbreaking clinical trials that advanced PTCA into mainstream practice. With over 600 published papers and 10 co-edited books, including Interventional Cardiology and multiple editions of Hurst’s The Heart, his contributions to cardiology are immense. Recognized with the TCT Career Achievement Award (2009), the ETHICA Award, and the “Master of the Masters” Award at TCTAP (2015), his impact on the field is profound. One memory I cherish is from our very first meeting when I thanked him for traveling such a long distance to attend. With humility, he mentioned learning a great deal about left main stenting, which he couldn’t observe in the U.S. Since then, he has rarely missed our meetings. Spencer is truly someone we hold in the highest regard and remain deeply grateful for.
Spencer has been a driving force in invasive cardiology and interventional cardiology, and all aspects of cardiology. He has been a president of American Cardiology. He was head of the Interventional Cardiology Board Examination Writing Committee that I served with him on. He was in editor of JACC Intervention. So he has done it all. He has been a huge individual in the field. He has been incredibly productive. He is prolific in terms of giving talks, in terms of relating to people. But number one, he was incredibly involved with the American Cardiology. Number two, he was incredibly involved with the people around him, with his family around him. Number three, that really identifies multiple facets of Spencer B. King III. A great individual, a tireless worker in the field of interventional cardiology, in the field of education, in the field of science, in the field of research. A tremendous individual and tremendous friend. (David R. Holmes)
You’re the inventor of the multi-purpose catheter, and you kind of arm-twisted your fellows among them myself, to practice this multi-purpose catheter rather than using them more easy Judkins coronary catheter. This tremendously helped us to manipulate catheters in Sinus of Valsalva and this became particularly important when it came to manipulate guiding catheters for PCI. (Bernhard Meier) Spencer has been a special mentor to me. Obviously, we all know that Spencer is a giant in coronary angioplasty and has taught hundreds of thousands of interventionalists throughout the world. I was fortunate enough to succeed Spencer as the second chair of this committee. And I applied what I learned from Spencer, in really trying to achieve balance and achieve consensus and really sort of learned from how Spencer could run this committee and tried to apply to my role. (Alan C. Yeung)
I really thank you for all that you’ve done for interventional cardiology, from being there at the beginning, to helping us make this to the subspecialty. You’ve really truly served as a global ambassador for interventional cardiology around the world. You meant so much to me personally in terms of being a role model and really an inspiration for everything I’ve tried to accomplish. (Gregg W. Stone) For me, Spencer is responsible to the academic knowledge, to the clinical training. And also as a mentor, he taught me how to bring that, move that to the next generation, so that his legacy will always continue through the generation that I had fortunate to train. (Ron Waksman)