From Rome to Research- A Cardiologist’s Journey in Mentorship and Discovery
- Virginia Journal of Medicine
- May 31, 2025
- 7 min read
Updated: Jul 19, 2025
A Q&A with Dr. Antonio Abbate, MD, PhD
Article written by Catherine Lyons
In this installment of our mentor spotlight series, we speak with Dr. Antonio Abbate, a physician-scientist whose remarkable journey from medical school in Rome to academic medicine in the United States offers profound insights for anyone pursuing a career in clinical research, cardiology, or mentorship. With candor, humility, and passion, Dr. Abbate discusses what first drew him to medicine, how he mentors others, and why curiosity, compassion, and resilience remain at the heart of his work (pun intended).
As a cardiologist, Antonio Abbate, MD, PhD, cares for patients with heart disease. He specializes in cardio-immunology and cardio-oncology, evaluating and treating people with heart inflammation (pericarditis and myocarditis), and those at risk for heart complications due to cancer treatment.
Dr. Abbate is also a researcher whose interests include:
Finding the causes and mechanisms of heart disease
Understanding how inflammation affects the heart
Determining the factors that make heart disease worse
Developing new treatments for heart diseases
“I am passionate about bringing new findings to patients,” Dr. Abbate shares. “I work in the lab with basic scientists to discover new treatment targets and develop new drugs, and then design and conduct studies in patients.”
Dr. Abbate was born in Fondi, a small town near Rome, Italy. In Rome, he received his medical degree from the University Campus Biomedico and completed his clinical training in cardiovascular medicine and PhD in molecular and cellular cardiology from Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Policlinico Agostino Gemelli.
After moving to the United States, he completed training in internal medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he worked for 15 years. He is happy to join UVA Health, where he gets to work with young people and help them grow in their careers.
Along with spending time with his wife and daughter, Dr. Abbate enjoys cooking, travel, movies, pickleball, and skiing.
Fun fact: He was named by Forbes magazine as a Top 27 cardiologists!
Q: Can you describe your journey to becoming a faculty mentor and what drew you to academia?
Dr. Abbate’s path to academic medicine began in Rome, Italy, where he attended University Campus BioMedico. It was during his third year of medical school that he had what he now calls a “pivotal awakening” -not from a lecture, but from a class assignment that asked students to present a research article they found compelling.
“Until then, I truly believed the answers to every question were in the textbook or in the minds of my professors. But that assignment made me realize how much we don’t know in medicine and how important it is to keep asking questions.”
That realization set him on a path of discovery. But it wasn’t just the unknown that drew him in, it was the example of a mentor. One of his professors, Dr. Dobrina, left a profound impression on him. He was brilliant, but also humble, never afraid to admit what medicine hadn’t figured out yet.
“He’d say things like, ‘We still don’t understand this,’ and it was never discouraging. It was inspiring. It was an invitation to help push the boundaries of knowledge.”
Dr. Dobrina planted the seed for what would become a career-long mission for Dr. Abbate: to not only care for patients, but to teach others how to care for them and to uncover better ways to do so.
“He told me, ‘If you take care of patients, you’ll help many people. But if you teach others, you’ll help many more. And if you do research, you can help people you’ll never even meet.’ That completely reframed how I saw my role in medicine.”
Q: How did your career evolve from that point?
In addition to his medical training, Dr. Abbate completed a PhD in molecular and cellular cardiology, moving deeper into laboratory-based science. His PhD research took him into animal models and molecular mechanisms of cardiovascular disease, giving him a new set of tools to investigate how the heart responds to injury and inflammation.
“That was when I started to fall in love with basic science. It was challenging, especially for someone who liked bedside medicine, but it opened my eyes to how cellular pathways could translate into therapies.”
Dr. Abbate ultimately moved to the US and joined faculty at Virginia Commonwealth University, where he split his time between clinical work in the coronary care unit, general cardiology practice, and an evolving research portfolio that transitioned from lab-based science to large-scale clinical trials.
“I never wanted to give up patient care. That’s where you feel the impact of your work most directly. But I also knew I had a responsibility to keep asking questions and to help others learn how to ask better ones.”
Q: How do you approach mentoring students and what do you find most effective?
Dr. Abbate is deeply intentional about how he mentors, and it all starts with understanding the student.
“The first thing I do is ask, ‘What are you hoping to learn? What are you hoping to feel?’ Because mentoring isn’t just about skills. It’s about helping someone discover what lights them up.”
He believes students benefit most when they’re exposed to the full reality of the profession, not just its highlights.
“Not every part of our job is exciting. Some parts are tedious, others are emotionally draining. But you need to see it all to know if this is the path for you.”
He also emphasizes that mentorship isn’t a one-size-fits-all relationship. Over the course of a career, he notes, students will likely need multiple mentors- each guiding a different aspect of their development.
“There’s no such thing as the mentor. There’s a mentor for research, another for clinical growth, another for navigating life decisions. Students should feel empowered to build a mentorship network.”
Perhaps most importantly, he encourages students to embrace uncertainty and remain open to unexpected discoveries in their careers.
“I didn’t sit down with a spreadsheet and decide cardiology was best. It chose me. I always tell students to get exposure to as much as possible. That ‘aha’ moment can come when you least expect it.”
Q: What key skills should students develop to succeed in your field or in research more broadly?
Dr. Abbate doesn’t hesitate when asked this.
“Passion and resilience. Those are the two most important traits, far more than any specific knowledge or technique.”
He explains that while knowledge and skills can be acquired over time, passion must come from within, and resilience is the only way to persist in a field where failure is common.
“In research, your first idea might not work. Your grant might not get funded. In medicine, a patient might not respond to treatment. If you don’t have that inner drive to keep going, to keep trying, this will be hard.”
He also stresses humility as an essential quality.
“One of my professors once told us: ‘Fifty percent of what we’re teaching you today will eventually be proven wrong. We just don’t know which fifty percent.’ That’s stuck with me my whole career.”
That mindset of staying open to change, new evidence, and better ideas is what makes medicine not just a job, but a lifelong calling.
Q: What are you most proud of in your career thus far?
Dr. Abbate pauses before answering, not because he doesn’t have accomplishments, but because so many are meaningful in different ways.
“The most immediate pride comes from patient care. When you help someone recover, when they return to their life, when a family thanks you. That’s incredibly fulfilling.”
But he also speaks with deep pride about his decades-long research into inflammation and heart disease. His first research project in medical school explored the role of inflammation in cardiovascular injury. He’s been working on that same question ever since.
“He told me, ‘Be careful-your first research project may be your last.’ And he was right. I fell in love with the question, and I never stopped chasing it.”
Today, inflammation is widely recognized as a key factor in cardiovascular disease. Anti-inflammatory therapies are now being tested in major trials, and for Dr. Abbate, this is both a professional and personal validation.
“To see a question I asked as a student now influencing clinical practice… that’s incredibly rewarding. It took 30 years, but it happened.”
Q: What do you love most about mentoring others?
For Dr. Abbate, mentoring is not just about shaping careers; it’s about building lasting relationships.
“The science is great. But what I cherish most are the people I’ve worked with.”
He regularly hears from former students and trainees, many of whom are now faculty members themselves, about their lives as they unfold in both professional and personal capacities.
“One sent me a picture of his newborn baby. Another sent me a photo from his engagement trip in France. That sense of connection, of being part of someone’s journey, is what makes mentoring so special.”
Q: Looking ahead, what emerging areas of research excite you the most?
One of the most surprising turns in Dr. Abbate’s career is how it’s led him back to one of his earliest interests: the mind.
“When I started medical school, I thought I might go into psychiatry. I studied philosophy in high school. I was fascinated by how the psyche affects health.”
Today, that interest has resurfaced through his research on the brain-heart connection. He’s currently studying Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, also known as stress cardiomyopathy, a condition where psychological or physical stress causes severe, sudden heart dysfunction.
“We know it exists. We can diagnose it. But we still don’t understand how to treat or prevent it. That’s the next frontier I want to explore.”
He also points out that Takotsubo predominantly affects post-menopausal women, yet another reason why sex-based differences in cardiovascular research matter.
“Historically, we’ve done a poor job including women in cardiovascular research. And worse, women, especially young women, with symptoms are more likely to be dismissed.”
This is a personal mission for him.
“It bothers me tremendously that a woman in the ER with chest pain might be told it’s ‘just anxiety,’ when she’s actually having a serious cardiac issue. We need to do better.”
Dr. Abbate’s story is a masterclass in curiosity, integrity, and impact. He reminds us that medicine is not a static profession; it’s a living, evolving dialogue between science, humanism, and mentorship.
His advice to students?
“Find mentors who make you want to be better, not just better doctors, but better people. And stay humble. You’re never done learning. That’s the beauty of it.”
Interested in reading more from Dr. Abbate? Check out some of his recent research works!
Del Buono MG, La Vecchia G, Montone RA, ...Abbate A. The Evolving Features of Takotsubo Syndrome. Curr Cardiol Rep. 2025;27(1):39. Published 2025 Jan 24. doi:10.1007/s11886-024-02154-y
Occhipinti G, Brugaletta S, Abbate A, et al. Inflammation in coronary atherosclerosis: diagnosis and treatment. Heart. Published online March 26, 2025. doi:10.1136/heartjnl-2024-325408
Biondi-Zoccai G, Weber BN, Abbate A, Booz GW. Cardiac Immunotherapy, Immuno-Cardiology, and the Future of Cardiovascular Pharmacology. J Cardiovasc Pharmacol. 2025;85(5):308-311. Published 2025 May 1. doi:10.1097/FJC.0000000000001687
La Vecchia G, Del Buono MG, Bonaventura A, ...Abbate A. Inflammatory Heart Disease in Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome. Curr Cardiol Rep. 2025;27(1):10. Published 2025 Jan 8. doi:10.1007/s11886-024-02173-9
Toldo S, Abbate A. The role of the NLRP3 inflammasome and pyroptosis in cardiovascular diseases. Nat Rev Cardiol. 2024;21(4):219-237. doi:10.1038/s41569-023-00946-3
