Dr Su Jang Wen

Dr Su Jang Wen graduated with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery from the University of Melbourne, Australia in 1998. Subsequently, he obtained his Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons (Edinburgh) and his Master of Medicine from the National University of Singapore in 2002 and 2003 respectively. In 2006, Dr Su became a Fellow of Royal College of Surgeons (Cardiothoracic Surgery, Edinburgh) and was the first ever Singapore candidate to be awarded the gold medal for the Fellowship examination. In the same year, Dr Su became a Fellow of the Academy of Medicine (Singapore) – Gold Medallist.

In 2007, Dr Su was awarded the Health Manpower Development Plan (HMDP) fellowship by the Ministry of Health in Singapore. From 2007-2009, he was the first foreign fellow to be a Chief Fellow of the Thoracic Surgery & Lung Transplantation Programme at the Cleveland Clinic in the United States of America. He received comprehensive training under world-renowned Thoracic & Esophageal Surgeon, Professor Thomas W Rice. He also completed a fellowship in Adult Cardiac Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic, which has proudly been ranked as the top Cardiothoracic Centre in the USA since 1995. During this time, he underwent intensive training by Dr Gosta Pettersson, Dr Nicholas Smedira and a panel of other world renowned surgeons and was the first Asian to receive a prestigious award for the best research paper.

Upon returning to Singapore in 2009, Dr Su served as a Consultant in the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the National Heart Centre in Singapore, making him one of the youngest ever cardiothoracic surgeons in the world. Since 2007, Dr Su has accumulated extensive experience having carried out more than 3,000 heart, lung and esophageal surgeries. He was also a visiting consultant at the National Cancer Centre in Singapore and Changi General Hospital. During his practice at the National Heart Centre Singapore, he held the record of having no mortalities in most elective heart and lung surgery, including coronary artery bypass graft, cardiac valvular and acute aortic dissection procedures.

Apart from performing a full range of surgery for cardiac and thoracic conditions, Dr Su’s main interest is in Minimally Invasive Surgery. In 2009, Dr Su pioneered Minimally Invasive Cardiac Surgery at the National Heart Centre in Singapore. He further developed and successfully applied this state-of-the-art technique in coronary artery bypass surgery, valvular surgery (aortic, mitral and tricuspid), atrial septal defect closure, arrhythmia surgery, ventricular aneurysm repair and acute ventricular septal rupture. The latter 2 surgeries were first of its kind in the world. Dr Su was also the first surgeon to have performed minimally invasive coronary artery bypass surgery in Gleneagles Hospital in 2013.

For thoracic surgery, apart from routinely performing video assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) in lung cancer, for mediastinal tumours and many other thoracic conditions, Dr Su was also the first in South East Asia to have successfully resected lung cancer using the Da Vinci Robot.

Dr Su has given numerous presentations at international meetings, some of which have won Best Paper Awards. He has given many lectures on Minimally Invasive Cardiac and Thoracic Surgery in various countries. In addition, he published his cardiac and thoracic works in multiple peer-reviewed international medical journals. Dr Su also co-authored the textbook chapter “Minimally Invasive Approaches to Lung Cancer” in Greene’s Minimally Invasive Cancer Management.

In addition to that, Dr Su served as an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Duke-NUS graduate Medical School and was also a Clinical Physician Faculty Member for SingHealth’s Residency Program where he was in charge of thoracic surgery training.

Dr Su is a member of the International Society of Minimally Invasive Cardiothoracic Surgery  (ISMICS), International Society of Heart Lung Transplantation, Singapore Oncology Society, Singapore Cardiac Society, Singapore Thoracic Society, Singapore Heart Lung Transplantation Society, Chapter of Cardiothoracic Surgery and Academy of Medicine, Singapore.

Dr Su received the Gold Service Quality Award from Singhealth and National Heart Centre Singapore in 2012.  He is the only foreign visiting cardiothoracic consultant to Malaysia and Vietnam where he holds regular practice at Timberland Medical Centre in Kuching, Sarawak.  In addition to that, he is also a visiting consultant at City International Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.