Cardiothoracic Surgeon Maastricht University Medical Center and CARIM Maastricht University

Bart Maesen studied medicine at the University of Antwerp, Belgium and obtained a research position to conduct research on ischaemia/reperfusion injury following his graduation. Afterwards he moved to Maastricht, the Netherlands. He started his training in Cardiothoracic surgery with a 4 -years fellowship at the electrophysiology lab of Prof Maurits Allessie and Prof Ulli Schotten in 2006. Based on the research performed in this period, he obtained his PhD with a thesis on structure-function relationships of atrial fibrillation waves in goat and man.

During his surgical traineeship he was trained in arrhythmia surgery by Prof Mark La Meir. With his understanding of electrophysiology and manual skills, he was soon able to take over the hybrid AF ablation program and together with interventional electrophysiologist Laurent Pison and with the support of Prof Harry Crijns, he developed an international highly acclaimed minimally invasive hybrid arrhythmia surgery program at Maastricht University Medical Centre.

Bart became staff member in 2017 and is currently head of our Arrhythmia surgery program. He is setting up a translational research program with focus on improving outcome in surgical AF management by better understanding of basic mechanisms and concepts. He supervises several PhD students and helps other centers to start their own AF minimally invasive hybrid AF program. He is also performing transcatheter procedures and minimally invasive endoscopic mitral valve surgery.