Karl B. Kern, MD

Before retiring as a professor emeritus in July 2022, Dr. Kern was the Gordon A. Ewy, MD Distinguished Endowed Chair of Cardiovascular Medicine at the University of Arizona Sarver Heart Center, chair of the Sarver Heart Center Resuscitation Research Group and professor of medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson. Dr. Kern is a fellow of the American College of Physicians, a fellow of both the Council of Clinical Cardiology and the Cardiopulmonary, Critical Care, Peri-operative, and Resuscitaiton Council of the American Heart Association, a fellow of the American College of Chest Physicians, a fellow of the American College of Cardiology and a fellow of the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions.

Dr. Kern was the coordinator of the University of Arizona Sarver Heart Center Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Research Group. He was inducted as an honorary member of the European Resuscitation Council in 2014 and named a CPR Giant by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation in 2015. He has been awarded numerous American Heart Association grants, an AHA-Flinn Young Investigator award, and two three-year awards from the Arizona Disease Control Research Commission grant in the area of basic CPR research, and one three year award to perform an investigator-initiated pilot RCT of early cath versus no early cath for those post cardiac arrest without ST elevation. He has published over 250 scholarly reports, including 180 peer-reviewed original scientific articles. He has been a visiting professor at the Sao Paulo School of Medicine, Sao Paulo, Brazil, and at The Leopold-Franzeus University of Innsbruck in Innsbruck, Austria.

Dr. Kern is active in the American Heart Association, serving as president of the Old Pueblo Division, Arizona Affiliate in 1992, and president of the AHA - Arizona Affiliate in 1993. He was chairman of the American Heart Association National Subcommittee for Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) from 1997-2000. He was Chairman of the of the American Heart Association's Cardiopulmonary, Critical Care, Peri-opertive and Resuscitaiton Council during 2001-2013. He is currently the Chairman of the American Heart Association's Emergency Cardiovascular Care Committee. He is a past chairman of the Emergency Cardiac Care Committee of the American College of Cardiology and a past governor of Arizona for the American College of Cardiology.