Devi Prasad Shetty

Doctor of Laws

School of Public Health, April 19, 2011

Devi Prasad Shetty is a professor at Rajiv Gandhi University of Medical Sciences, Bangalore, India and the founder and chairman of Bangalore's Narayana Hrudayalaya, one of the world's largest hospitals. Nicknamed the King of Hearts, Dr. Shetty delivers complex cardiac care to tens of thousands of people from all over the world, with a special focus on children, and believes that health care is a fundamental human right that should be available to all without regard for the ability to pay. He is the first to perform heart surgery on newborns in India and the first to use a microchip camera to close holes in the heart. In the early 1990s, he was Mother Teresa's cardiologist. He and his team have performed over 100,000 major heart surgeries, 30,000 of which were on children. He and his colleagues have forged a strong and productive partnership with the University of Minnesota in the areas of education, research, and technology transfer. University of Minnesota cardiovascular surgical staff and fellows have the opportunity to spend time at Narayana Hrudayalaya to observe and perform procedures that they would encounter less frequently in the U.S. setting. University of Minnesota medical students can spend time at Dr. Shetty's facility to gain exposure to a wide breadth and quantity of conditions. Physicians from India come to the University of Minnesota to learn about left-ventricular assist device (LVAD), which provides a bridge for patients awaiting a heart transplant. The University of Minnesota's School of Nursing and the Department of Anesthesiology also have partnerships with Narayana Hrudayalaya. And, to gain expertise in building a cancer registry and to conduct joint research, Dr. Shetty and his colleagues are working with the University of Minnesota Masonic Cancer Center. Dr. Shetty is the recipient of the Padma Shree Award (one of the top civilian awards conferred by the Government of India), and he was presented with the Social Entrepreneurship Award at the World Economic Forum in 2005.