ABSTRACT
During my fellowship years, 1967-1969, a year of research was not required as it is now. The tools of paediatric cardiology were limited. However, it was expected that a paediatric cardiologist would go to an academic centre or large general hospital with a residency programme. Therefore, it was expected that the paediatric cardiologist would be able to conduct research, at least on the clinical level. My chief and mentor Dr. Jerry Liebman insisted that the Fellow learn how to do research and publish the findings. Since his interests were primarily related to electrocardiography and vectorcardiography, that is the area that I directed my efforts toward. During my fellowship my primary project was to measure 95 different components of the adolescent EKG. This was performed on the EKG’s of 114 adolescents judged to be normal by history and physical examination. Therefore, I made 11,730 measurements, manually, without any summer student help. That paper was finally finished and published in the American Heart Journal in January, 1972[1]. However, Dr. Liebman always insisted that whatever one does for research should arouse the researcher’s curiosity and the researcher should enjoy the quest. In the second year of my fellowship he allowed me to spend three months in the laboratory of Dr. Herman Hellerstein, the pioneer of rehabilitative cardiology. Dr. Hellerstein exposed me to the clinical research exercise laboratory and what it could provide. Until he began to report that the clinical exercise test was much more useful than just to look at the J point and the ST segment for is-chaemia, the test was under-used (the cycle ergometer was nothing more than an extension of the Master’s Two-Step test). Dr. Hellerstein advocated the multiple facets of exercise testing for the evaluation of the patient and for progressive rehabilitation. His rehabilitation programme at the Cleveland Heights Jewish Community Centre was the prototype and model for all cardiovascular rehabilitation programmes.
