Adam Zucker, M.D.
Specialty: Interventional Cardiology
Office Location:
St. Joseph’s/Candler Physician Network – Cardiology Associates
11700 Mercy Blvd., Plaza D, Building 6
Savannah, Ga. 31419
912-927-3434
Education:
Medical degree: Duke University of Medicine
Internal medicine internship and residency: Mt. Sinai Hospital
Cardiovascular disease and interventional cardiology fellowship: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Cardiovascular device research fellowship: Center for Devices and Radiologic Health
St. Joseph’s/Candler Interventional Cardiologist Dr. Adam Zucker can clear a blockage in your heart, but ideally, he wants to help prevent that from even happening
SJ/C: Why did you decide to become a doctor?
They ask that in medical school, and the answer I gave then is probably the same answer – to help people. My step father who is/was a physician said, ‘If you want to help people, go into public policy because truthfully you can probably help far more people giving clean water to varying segments of the United States than you can by being a physician.’ He’s a 100 percent correct. So it has to do to some degree with a somewhat selfish desire to help people, which I don’t mean that badly. I want to be hands-on with my patients and see the impact that makes. As things have changed over the years, do I really think that is still true? The answer is yes. I still want to help people. I continue to like the interaction with people. I like it more now than I thought I would then, because I actually know what it is.
SJ/C: What made you decide on the specialty of interventional cardiology?
I like using my hands. I always have. When I was a little kid I wanted to be a carpenter. I’m definitely not a carpenter. Cardiology is an area where I get to use knowledge of internal medicine, which I liked going into, but be more hands on. There are a couple of those – there’s GI, some aspects of neurology and then there’s cardiology. Between GI and cardiology, I was much more drawn to cardiology.
SJ/C: What are some common conditions you treat and procedures you do?
I think prevention is very important. I try to be good about preventative cardiology. I firmly believe that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I am a general cardiologist so I see all sorts of conditions from any type of heart failure to coronary disease to high blood pressure to high cholesterol to helping diagnosis peripheral arterial disease. I see the entire gamut of cardiology including electrophysiology, such as AFib. (AFib, or atrial fibrillation, is a type of irregular heart rhythm.) When it does get complicated, we have further subspecialists – electrophysiologists – to help treat those.
I am also an interventional cardiologist, which is basically a glorified plumber. I put in stents. I have done lots and lots of those. All of us here who do them are called high-volume operators, which means you do above a certain number so you have theoretically a better skill set at it than people who don’t have that volume.
SJ/C: How do you use technology in the procedures you do?
At the beginning of my training, we were primarily going through the groin to get to the heart, which requires larger catheters. The catheter is the tube that gets threaded through the arteries. By the time I was done with my training, technology had progressed that we were primarily doing radial procedures, meaning going through the wrist. That actually has lowered complications for procedures because instead of using larger catheters through a large artery, you can use smaller ones through a smaller artery and that helps prevent a ton of complications from these procedures. We are able to do more and more things from the wrist.
Our stents are advancing so we can get to more areas. The technologies that we can use to treat disease within the vessel is advancing. We can actually treat higher complexity of lesions. Additionally, it used to be that you had to spend the night in the hospital whenever you had a stent. Now, it’s rarer that someone needs to spend the night. They have to meet a couple of conditions or live so far away we don’t feel comfortable with them going home.
Technology has allowed us to use smaller blood vessels, and it has allowed us to treat higher risk and more complex lesions than we could before, as well as decrease the complications from these procedures so it's certainly advanced during my career so far.
SJ/C: What do you see in the future of cardiology and treating heart conditions?
As our stents and other things theoretically continue to get better – not that they are not good currently – we can treat more lesions and take care of recurrent blockages. Hopefully, things develop that can help us augment what we can do through the wrist and move some of the technology that requires larger-sized catheters to smaller-sized catheters. Miniaturization continues to occur so that’s good.
If we could have more preventative methods, that would be lovely. As much as I like putting stents in, the perfect outcome is where I am not having to put stents in at all.
SJ/C: What is some common advice you share with patients for good heart health?
I am a big advocate of diet and exercise. In general, I think moderation is key. Especially in younger people, if you tell them, ‘You can never have that,’ would I even follow my own advice? Probably not. Could I have less of that? Maybe I don’t have as much of that as I like. Additionally, the best warning system that we have is exerting ourselves. So if we are sedentary than it’s hard to know if we are out of breath or if we get chest pain when we move around because we do it rarely. But if we exercise, not only does that decrease our risk of cardiovascular disease but it also gives us a very good warning system about things that could be going wrong if suddenly we can’t do the things we could do a month ago. Those are two relatively straight forward things that someone can do that can certainly help both decrease your risk but also give you a reasonable idea that something is occurring.
Family: Married with two teenagers – son, 16, daughter, 14 – and two dogs and a cat
Hobbies/Interests: At this age, there is a lot of chauffeuring the kids around. I actually do enjoy taking care of the dogs as well as cooking and baking (in moderation of course). I also very much enjoy boating when there is time and traveling with my family whenever I get the chance. There is not a ton of extra time in my life, and maybe I try to do too much, but it does keep me occupied and engaged.