Dr. Giuseppe Raffa is an attending of Cardiac Surgery at The Mediterranean Institute for Transplantation and Highly Specialized Therapies (ISMETT), a Scientific Institute of Hospitalization and Care (IRCCS) and the product of an international partnership between Italy and UPMC. Prior to joining IRCCS-ISMETT in 2016, Dr. Raffa served as a cardiac surgeon at the Instituto Clinico Humanitas in Milan. He received clinical and research training at prestigious institutions all over the world, including the University of Pittsburgh, where he was employed as a visiting research fellow. Dr. Raffa currently holds an appointment as Clinical Associate Professor with the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery.
Dr. Raffa is dedicated to his scholarly work; to date he has authored or co-authored over 150 peer-reviewed publications, in addition to 30+ abstracts and 10 abstracts published in scientific journals. He is actively involved from an editorial standpoint, serving on the Editorship Committees for Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine, Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine and Perfusion. Dr. Raffa remains highly engaged with his profession, as he holds membership in several professional and scientific societies, and has participated in various local, regional, and international seminars and lectureships. Dr. Raffa is also deeply committed to teaching throughout his career, having served as a mentor to trainees and medical students both here in Pittsburgh and abroad. Dr. Raffa’s operative care and scholarly achievements have made the Department proud to have an exemplary international representative of UPMC.
- MD, University of Messina School of Medicine
- Cardiac Surgery Fellowship, IRCCS-ISMETT, Palermo
- PhD, Cardiothoracic Surgery, Maastricht University Medical Centre, Netherlands
Education & Training
To learn more about Dr. Raffa's publications, please visit PubMed.
Dr. Raffa has served as a collaborator on multiple projects: the Advanced Study of Aortic Pathology (ASAP) Study conducted at Karolinska University Hospital, the largest worldwide study of patients with bicuspid aortic valve undergoing cardiac surgery; and the OPERA multicenter trial, which examined whether perioperative intake of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids will reduce the occurrence of postoperative atrial fibrillation/flutter in patients undergoing cardiac surgery.
Dr. Raffa's current research interests include examining the effects of several cardiovascular drugs and surgical techniques on left ventricle remodeling. His efforts seek to evaluate these effects with trough imaging modalities available, i.e. CT scan and MRI.