About

Bonnie Ky, MD, MSCE, is the Founders Professor of Cardio-Oncology at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. She is a faculty member in the Cardiovascular Institute and the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics at the same institution. Dr. Ky serves as the Director of the Penn Center for Quantitative Echocardiography and the Thalheimer Center for Cardio-Oncology, and is a member of the Abramson Cancer Center. Her clinical expertise focuses on noninvasive imaging via echocardiography and the care of cancer patients with cardiovascular concerns, risk factors, or disease. Her research program centers on cardiotoxicity from cancer therapy, aiming to detect, prevent, and treat heart damage caused by cancer treatments. Her work involves studying changes in heart function related to common cancer therapies, understanding individual patient risk, and translating these findings into clinical practice to improve outcomes for cancer patients and survivors. Dr. Ky's research has contributed to defining the impact of breast cancer therapies on heart function, developing innovative imaging strategies to predict cardiotoxicity, and exploring blood markers for early detection of heart damage.

Research topics

• Medicine
• Internal medicine
• Cardiology
• Oncology

Selected publications

• Changes in Cardiovascular Biomarkers With Breast Cancer Therapy and Associations With Cardiac Dysfunction

  Journal of the American Heart Association · 2020 · 160 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Medicine
  • Internal medicine
  • Cardiology

  Background We examined the longitudinal associations between changes in cardiovascular biomarkers and cancer therapy-related cardiac dysfunction (CTRCD) in patients with breast cancer treated with cardotoxic cancer therapy. Methods and Results Repeated measures of high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T (hs-cTnT), NT-proBNP (N-terminal pro-B-type natriuretic peptide), myeloperoxidase, placental growth factor, and growth differentiation factor 15 were assessed longitudinally in a prospective cohort of 323 patients treated with anthracyclines and/or trastuzumab followed over a maximum of 3.7 years with serial echocardiograms. CTRCD was defined as a ≥10% decline in left ventricular ejection fraction to a value <50%. Associations between changes in biomarkers and left ventricular ejection fraction were evaluated in repeated-measures linear regression models. Cox regression models assessed the associations between biomarkers and CTRCD. Early increases in all biomarkers occurred with anthracycline-based regimens. hs-cTnT levels >14 ng/L at anthracycline completion were associated with a 2-fold increased CTRCD risk (hazard ratio, 2.01; 95% CI, 1.00-4.06). There was a modest association between changes in NT-proBNP and left ventricular ejection fraction in the overall cohort; this was most pronounced with sequential anthracycline and trastuzumab (1.1% left ventricular ejection fraction decline [95% CI, -1.8 to -0.4] with each NT-proBNP doubling). Increases in NT-proBNP were also associated with CTRCD (hazard ratio per doubling, 1.56; 95% CI, 1.32-1.84). Increases in myeloperoxidase were associated with CTRCD in patients who received sequential anthracycline and trastuzumab (hazard ratio per doubling, 1.28; 95% CI, 1.04-1.58). Conclusions Cardiovascular biomarkers may play an important role in CTRCD risk prediction in patients with breast cancer who receive cardiotoxic cancer therapy, particularly in those treated with sequential anthracycline and trastuzumab therapy. Clinical Trial Registration URL: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/. Unique identifier: NCT01173341.

  DOI

Recent grants

• Mechanistic Risk Prediction of Radiation Therapy Cardiotoxicity

  NIH · $3.7M · 2020–2027

• Long Term Effects of Breast Cancer Therapy on Cardiac Remodeling and Function

  NIH · $447k · 2021–2025

• NIH Grant R01HL118018

  NIH · $3.7M · 2020

• NIH Grant R34HL146927

  NIH · $757k · 2023

• NIH Grant K23HL095661

  NIH · $704k · 2015

Frequent coauthors

• Daniel J. Lenihan

  277 shared

• James C. Fang

  University of Utah

  177 shared

• Alexander R. Lyon

  169 shared

• Anju Nohria

  Dana-Farber Brigham Cancer Center

  160 shared

• Thomas P. Cappola

  University of Pennsylvania Health System

  159 shared

• Daniela Cardinale

  European Institute of Oncology

  154 shared

• Javed Butler

  Baylor Medical Center at Garland

  147 shared

• Michelle Bloom

  New York University

  147 shared

Labs

• Bonnie Ky LabPI

Awards & honors

• Founders Professor of Cardio-Oncology

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