Associate Professor of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medical College
Practice Location
Methodist DeBakey Cardiology Associates
Smith Tower
6550 Fannin, Suite 1901
Houston, TX 77030
713-441-1100
Medical School
Instituto Technologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico. Graduated with Honors.
Medicine Residency
Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas
Cardiology Fellowship
Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas
Areas of Interest
- Congestive heart failure
- Left ventricular assist device
- Heart transplantation
- Heart catheterization including RV biopsy
Board Certification
- Cardiovascular Disease
- Advanced Heart Failure/Transplant Cardiology
Languages
English and Spanish
Biography
Dr. Torre-Amione is Chief of the Heart Failure Division, Department of Cardiology, dividing his time between an active clinical practice and research on heart failure. His research focuses on the applied clinical investigation in the areas of heart failure and cardiac transplantation. His lab conducts a variety of clinical research protocols, including multinational studies and investigator-initiated protocols.
He is also responsible for the operation of the Gene and Judy Campbell Laboratory for Cardiac Transplant Research, where human myocardial samples, as well as microscopic analysis and histological evaluation of a variety of proteins, are performed. The research examines the mechanisms of cardiac inflammation as it relates to myocardial dysfunction in the areas of heart failure and cardiac transplantation. Dr. Torre's clinical and basic laboratories are committed to the development of better therapies focused on the modulation of immune responses in patients with heart failure and cardiac transplant. This is accomplished with the help of the augmentation cardiac function, and the illumination of the inflammatory response that occurs in both heart failure status and in the heart transplant state.
Dr. Torre received his medical degree from the Instituto Technologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey in Monterrey, Mexico and his doctorial degree in Immunology at the University of Chicago. He has received several awards and honors, including first prize at the Baylor College of Medicine, Department of Medicine Research Competition in 1994. That same year, Dr. Torre-Amione received the special investigation award from the Federation of Clinical Research. Other awards included first prize among the 1996 Astra Merck Young Investigators Awards and the Junior Faculty Award from SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals in November 1997.
Dr. Torre has several active and planned protocols that are in various stages of development. The active studies include outpatient oral drug studies for patients with chronic heart failure, pacemaker and device studies for patients with chronic heart failure, inpatient IV drug studies for heart failure patients who are acutely ill, ventricular assist device studies for patients who are critically ill, and an immunomodulatory outpatient trial as well as some very novel investigator initiated studies. Dr. Torre's investigator initiated research includes a study with cardiac transplant patients designed to impact the cardiac hypertrophy that naturally follows transplantation. It also includes a protocol for autologous stem cell transfer in patients with advanced refractory heart failure and a novel study involving plasma exchange in advanced heart failure patients. Several of the investigator-initiated protocols have required application to the FDA for an IND (investigational new drug designation).
