Division of Cardiology

Hisham Dokainish

M.D., FRCPC, FACC, FASE

Associate Professor, Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine
Cardiologist, Hamilton Health Sciences

Education and Professional Standing

Dr. Dokainish completed his Bachelor in the Special Arts and Sciences Programme followed by Medical School at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. He subsequently completed Internal Medicine and Cardiology Residency programmes at the University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario. After completing a one-year Echocardiography Fellowship at Vancouver General Hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, Dr. Dokainish was hired on faculty in 2002 in the Division of Cardiology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas where he remained until returning to Hamilton as Director of Echocardiography at Hamilton Health Sciences in 2009.

Clinical Interests

Dr. Dokainish is a full-time clinical cardiologist at Hamilton Health Sciences who specializes in echocardiography. Along with attending on cardiology service and clinics, Dr. Dokainish spends significant time reading and performing echocardiograms and administering the echocardiography laboratories at the Hamilton Health Sciences sites.

Research Interests

Dr. Dokainish’s research interests include cardiac hemodynamic evaluation by echocardiography including diastolic function. His recent work has involved the echocardiographic assessment of myocardial mechanics using multivector myocardial strain imaging in patients with cardiac disease. Since returning to McMaster University, Dr. Dokainish has headed a core echocardiography laboratory for a large, international clinical study run by the Population Health Research Institute (PHRI), and has started research in knowledge translation as it applies to echocardiographic reporting.

Selected Funding

  1. American College of Cardiology Foundation Early Career Award. 2005-2005.
  2. The Methodist Hospital Foundation Research Award. 2004-2006.
  3. McMaster University/Hamilton Health Sciences Cardiology AFP Research Grant 2010.

Selected Publications

  1. Dokainish H, Zoghbi WA, Lakkis NM, Al-Bakshy F, Dhir M, Quinones MA, Nagueh SF. Optimal Noninvasive Assessment of Left Ventricular Filling Pressures. A Comparison of Tissue Doppler Echocardiography and B-Type Natriuretic Peptide in Patients with Pulmonary Artery Catheters. Circulation 2004;109: 2432-2439.
  2. Dokainish H, Pillai M, Murphy S, Dibattiste P, Schweiger M, Lotfi A, Morrow D, Cannon C, Braunwald E, Lakkis N. Prognostic Implications of Elevated Troponin in Patients with Suspected Acute Coronary Syndrome but No Critical Epicardial Coronary Disease: A TACTICS TIMI-18 Substudy. J Am Coll Cardiol 2005;45:19-24.
  3. Dokainish H, Zoghbi WA, Lakkis NM, Ambriz E, Patel R, Quiñones MA, Nagueh SF. Incremental Predictive Power of B-Type Natriuretic Peptide and Tissue Doppler Echocardiography in the Prognosis of Patients with Congestive Heart Failure. J Am Coll Cardiol 2005;45:1223-6.
  4. Mcculloch M, Zoghbi WA, Davis R, Thomas C, Dokainish H. Color Tissue Doppler Myocardial Velocities Consistently Underestimate Spectral Tissue Doppler Velocities. J Am Soc Echocardiogr 2006;19:744-8.
  5. Dokainish H, Sengupta R, Patel R, Lakkis N. Usefulness of right ventricular tissue Doppler imaging to predict outcome in left ventricular heart failure independent of left ventricular diastolic function. Am J Cardiol 2007;99:961-5.
  6. Dokainish H, Sengupta R, Pillai M, Bobek J, Lakkis N. Usefulness of New Diastolic Strain and Strain Rate Indexes for the Estimation of Left Ventricular Filling Pressure. Am J Cardiol 2008;101:1504-9.
  7. Dokainish H, Sengupta R, Pillai M, Bobek J, Lakkis N. Assessment of left ventricular systolic function using echocardiography in patients with preserved ejection fraction and elevated diastolic pressures. Am J Cardiol 2008;101:1766-71
  8. Dokainish H, Sengupta R, Pillai M, Bobek J, Lakkis N. Correlation of Tissue Doppler and Two-Dimensional Speckle Myocardial Velocities and Comparison of Derived Ratios with Invasively Measured Left Ventricular Filling Pressures. J Am Soc Echocardiogr 2009;22:284-9.
  9. Dokainish H, Nguyen JS, Sengupta R, Pillai M, Alam M, Bobek J, Lakkis N. Do additional echocardiographic variables increase the accuracy of E/e' for predicting left ventricular filling pressure in normal ejection fraction? An echocardiographic and invasive hemodynamic study. J Am Soc Echocardiogr 2010;23:156-61.
  10. Nguyen JS, Lakkis NM, Bobek J, Goswami R, Dokainish H. Systolic and Diastolic Myocardial Mechanics in Patients with Cardiac Disease and Preserved Ejection Fraction: Impact of Left Ventricular Filling Pressure. J Am Soc Echocardiogr 2010;23: 1273-80.