M. Reza Movahed, MD, PhD

M. Reza Movahed, MD, PhD, is a clinical professor of medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson and the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix. He is also a faculty cardiologist at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System and a member of the Sarver Heart Center.

Dr. Movahed received his medical degree and Dr. Med. degree from Medizinische Hochschule Hannover in Germany, graduating with highest honors. He completed residency training at the University of Rochester in New York, a cardiology fellowship at the University of South Carolina and an interventional cardiology fellowship at Yale University Hospital in New Haven, Connecticut.

Dr. Movahed worked at the University of California, Irvine, as an assistant clinical professor before joining the University of Arizona College of Medicine in 2006 as an associate professor of medicine. He was promoted to tenured professor of medicine in 2010 and later became a clinical professor. He was appointed clinical professor of medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix in 2018.

His previous leadership roles include director of the Cardiac Catheterization Laboratory and Nuclear Cardiology Laboratory at the University of California, Irvine Medical Center, director of the Coronary Care Unit and medical director of cardiac transplantation at the University of Arizona Medical Center, and medical director of heart transplantation at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System. He also served as regional cardiology director for CareMore in Arizona and was appointed cardiology director of Total Care in 2022. He has served as CEO of CardioCare since 2007.

Dr. Movahed’s major research areas include coronary intervention, noninvasive cardiology and cardiovascular epidemiology. He is known for the “Movahed Classification” of coronary bifurcation lesions, “Movahed’s sign,” which describes flattening of the interventricular septum as a sign of right ventricular overload on gated SPECT studies, and the reverse “Movahed Maneuver,” which is used to improve stent deliverability during difficult and tortuous vein graft interventions.

Dr. Movahed has two issued cardiovascular patents, including a device to remove contrast from the coronary sinus during coronary angiography or intervention to reduce kidney exposure to contrast, and a method and device to measure the cross-sectional lumen of a vessel using impedance sensors. He also developed the Movahed protocol and algorithm for the prevention of intubation in patients with severe hypoxic cardiogenic pulmonary edema without cardiogenic shock.

He has published more than 300 peer-reviewed publications in cardiovascular medicine, including work in the New England Journal of Medicine, Nature Reviews, Circulation, Journal of the American College of Cardiology, American Journal of Cardiology, Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography, JACC: Cardiovascular Interventions, JACC: Cardiovascular Imaging, Catheterization and Cardiovascular Interventions, Journal of Invasive Cardiology and Journal of Interventional Cardiology. He has a Google Scholar h-index of 44.

Dr. Movahed has served on editorial boards for peer-reviewed journals and has been an invited speaker and chair at national and international cardiology conferences. He has held board certifications in internal medicine, echocardiography, cardiovascular disease, advanced heart failure and transplantation, nuclear cardiology and interventional cardiology. He chaired the Heart and Stroke Ball in 2020 and 2024 and served as president of the American Heart Association Southern Arizona Affiliate.

Outside his cardiovascular work, Dr. Movahed has also published on theoretical physics.