Krishna Pundi, MD

Cardiac electrophysiologist at Palo Alto VA Medical Center and instructor at the Stanford University School of Medicine  

Dr. Pundi is not waiting for the future of cardiovascular medicine to arrive. He is building the infrastructure that will carry it there. He is 35 years old and already working at the frontier of three of the most consequential challenges in cardiology: the integration of wearable and remote monitoring technologies into clinical practice, the design of more efficient and rigorous clinical trials for atrial fibrillation therapies, and the democratization of digital cardiovascular innovation to underserved patient populations. 

One of Krishna’s current projects exemplifies his operating model. Recognizing that atrial fibrillation clinical trials lack a directly measurable indicator of disease severity—a gap that lengthens trial timelines, inflates costs and slows the translation of effective therapies to patients—he convened a think tank of nearly 50 scientists, cardiovascular executives and FDA program leads to chart a path toward validating AF burden as a clinical trial endpoint. The downstream implications are significant: shorter trial timelines, new applications for remote monitoring technology and faster access to better treatments for the tens of millions of patients living with AF. 

His publication record in JAMA Cardiology and other leading journals, his receipt of the Bill Lewis Young Investigator Award and the Edwin Alderman Award for Excellence in Clinical Research, his peer-reviewed grant funding, and his leadership roles at the ACC, HRS and HRX reflect a scientific and professional footprint that many if not most cardiologists spend entire careers building. 

Dr. Krishna Pundi is clinically excellent, scientifically rigorous and relentlessly oriented toward impact at scale. As such, he epitomizes what the next generation of cardiovascular leadership looks like—or ought to.