Dr. Peter Rahko is a faculty member in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine within the Department of Medicine. Dr. Rahko first joined the Department of Medicine in 1985 and was the first director of the adult echocardiography laboratory. He helped grow the lab over the last 40 years and recently stepped down as the director. Dr. Rahko is dedicated to education for fellows, residents and sonography students. I am a former director of the fellowship program and continues to be the Medical Director for the echocardiography section of training for the School of Diagnostic Ultrasonography at the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics.
Dr. Rahko has also served as the Chair of the Minimal Risk Institutional Review Board for the University of Wisconsin. Outside of the university, Dr. Rahko serves as the deputy editor of the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography where he has the opportunity to evaluate research manuscripts from all over the world. He has served on the national writing committee to develop and define the complete transthoracic echocardiographic exam for the American Society of Echocardiography; has been the liaison for the American Society of Echocardiography to the American Medical Association; a member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography; and a member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Echocardiography. He is past president of the Northland Affiliate of the American Heart Association and past Governor of the Wisconsin Chapter of the American College of Cardiology. He has also served on several guideline writing committees including the ACC/AHA heart failure guideline committee and the American Society of Echocardiography point of care ultrasound guideline committee.
His clinical interests include heart failure, and he has participated in many clinical trials and, as a member of the heart failure and transplant section continues to treat a wide variety of heart failure and cardiomyopathy patients in clinic.
Dr. Rahko research interests include innovative new medical therapies for end-stage heart failure and he is also involved in designing research projects utilizing all aspects of echocardiography. An active area of work for Dr. Rahko is the introduction of AI into the lab to assist in diagnosing HFpEF and amyloid heart disease, with hopes to continue to assist in new developments of AI for the lab to further assist in diagnosing heart disease and enhancing workflow.