The University of Kentucky Department of Surgery welcomed a new cardiothoracic transplant specialist, Matthias Loebe, MD, PhD, to its faculty in the division of cardiothoracic surgery. With the start of his practice in March, UK HealthCare is excited to continue offering lung transplant procedures to Kentucky patients in need and contribute to the growth of the heart transplant program.
Dr. Loebe has over three decades of experience in the field of transplant surgery. Born and raised in northern Germany, he attended medical school at Free University Berlin in the late 1980s, when the city was still divided east and west. While earning his medical degree, Dr. Loebe spent six months at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas working under the direction of Drs. Michael DeBakey and George Noon.
His advanced training includes a surgical residency completed at Jewish Hospital in Berlin. After completing a fellowship in cardiothoracic surgery at the German Heart Institute, Berlin, he joined that Institute’s faculty, eventually becoming Vice-Chair of the Department of Surgery.
The Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) recruited him in 2000 to practice in the United States. Recruited, in part, to help build the mechanical support program for BCM, Dr. Loebe would play a key leadership role as director of the thoracic transplant program for Baylor and Houston Methodist Hospital. During his leadership, the lung transplant program at Houston Methodist would become, at the time, the largest in the world.
He left Houston in 2015 to lead the thoracic transplant and mechanical support program at the University of Miami. Over a decade later, he accepted the faculty appointment with the University of Kentucky.
Dr. Loebe brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the heart and lung transplant programs at UK HealthCare. As a specialist providing lung and heart treatment in southeastern Texas and southern Florida, he has long been an advocate for expanding highly specialized surgical care to underserved communities. It is a vision shared by the UK HealthCare Transplant Center faculty.
He looks forward to continuing to fulfill this goal as the center’s newest faculty member.