Freedom High Grad New Heart-Lung Surgeon at Lehigh Valley Hospital--Muhlenberg

Lehigh Valley, Pa. (May 4, 2007) – When Sanjay M. Mehta, M.D., was growing up in Bethlehem, he dreamed of becoming a heart surgeon. As a Boy Scout in the early 1980s, he watched his first surgery in the operating room at Lehigh Valley Hospital-Muhlenberg.

The 1983 Freedom High School graduate recently returned to the area to join Lehigh Valley Heart and Lung Surgeons at Lehigh Valley Hospital, which offers one of the state’s largest heart programs. He will perform cardio-thoracic surgery at Lehigh Valley Hospital—Muhlenberg, just a few miles from his boyhood home and where the seeds of his surgical career took root 20 years ago.

Mehta graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a bachelor’s in chemical engineering and earned his medical degree at the Pennsylvania State University’s College of Medicine in Hershey. He completed a general surgery residency and fellowship in cardio-thoracic surgery, also at Penn State—Hershey.

Before coming to Lehigh Valley Hospital, Mehta served as the surgical director of cardiac transplantation and associate professor of surgery at The Pennsylvania State University—Hershey Medical Center. He was part of the team there that developed the LionHeart ™ (Arrow International), a permanent, implanted pump that takes over the delivery of blood to the body in a patient with a severely weakened heart.

“I’m thrilled to be joining a growing organization and surgical group that provide excellent patient care and value the people who work for it,” Mehta says.

He will move to the area this summer with his wife Tara and their two children, ages 6 and 3.

In addition to Mehta, Lehigh Valley Heart and Lung Surgeons includes, Theodore G. Phillips, M.D., Raymond L. Singer, M.D., Michael F. Szwerc, M.D., Gary W. Szydlwoski, M.D., and James K. Wu, M.D.

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