Raffles Shield Panel Specialists

Professor with the Department of Surgery, at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine.

With more than 17 years of experience in Europe and Singapore as a Specialist Cardiothorasic Surgeon, Prof Kofidis’ mission is to help patients with heart conditions and disease in Singapore and around the world through less traumatic heart treatments and procedures. His clinical expertise encompasses an extensive range of traditional and less invasive, small-incision and keyhole access surgical procedures for bypass and heart valve surgery, including less invasive and hybrid heart surgery, heart failure surgery and off-pump procedures.

Prof Kofidis has introduced numerous new technologies in his field of practice regionally, and launched new types of less invasive surgery that include the first Same-stop-Hybrid Bypass procedure, Sutureless heart valves, automated knot-tying devices, and the first 3D-guided Minimally Invasive surgery. He also pioneered and invented NUHCS’ own minimally invasive procedure, called SIMICS (Single Incision minimally Invasive Cardiac Surgery). All these are now being featured in international medical professional forums, peer-reviewed journals and online portals such as Web of Science and Scopus. He has made outstanding contributions to heart-related research; and his innovations, discoveries and medical patents in heart surgery have earned him awards including the NHIC/SMART/SPRING I-2-Start Grant as well as the prestigious NRF/CGF grant for the Singvalve – a personalised, first-in-the-world human-like-designed Heart Valve prosthesis which has displayed clear superiority in preclinical trials, compared to anything currently available in the market. A/Prof Kofidis was also awarded the NUS-TAP Fund for a novel, suspended retractor and endoscopic camera system for Minimally Invasive Surgery.

He has trained in some of the world’s leading institutions such as the Strong Memorial Hospital (Rochester, New York, USA), the Texas Heart Institute (Houston, USA), the Hannover Medical School (Germany) and Stanford University Medical School (California, USA). Prof Kofidis was also given the honor of being an invited lecturer at the Bill Gates Research Centre, the American Medical Association, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United States of America (USA) between 2003-2004.

As an academic teacher, proctor and consultant in the field-related industry, Prof Kofidis is often invited to train doctors and nurses in minimally invasive heart surgeries, and conduct cardiac surgical workshops around the world. He founded the Initiative to promote Research and Innovative technology in Surgery (I.R.I.S) which has helped more than 150 students and postgraduates kick-start their academic career in this field. He is also an editor and reviewer for various other scientific bodies, and has published more than 150 articles in international journals, including Nature, Circulation, New England Journal of Medicine, Biomaterials, European Journal of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery and etc.

Prof Kofidis is a Fellow of Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, and also an elected member of the prestigious American Association of Thoracic Surgery. He is married to Persephone, an architect and they have a daughter, Danai. His hobbies include aviation (piloting planes), photography, working-out and reading.