This Lehigh Valley family is bonded by heart health care

The path toward becoming cardiologists has been a strange one for cousins Dr. Matthew Durkin and Dr. Brian Henstenburg.

Despite having a father and uncle who are cardiologists — or perhaps because of this — Durkin said for most of his life, cardiology wasn’t his dream career. At one point, he said, he wanted to be a veterinarian.

Henstenburg, a lifelong violinist, said being a musician was a dream of his at one point.

“My parents actually would have loved for me to go into that, but they had to settle for medicine,” Henstenburg said.

But now, both 29-year-olds have completed the grueling gauntlets of medical school and residencies and are taking their cardiology fellowships, the training doctors complete after their residency to become a specialist, in St. Luke’s University Health Network’s three-year Cardiovascular Disease Fellowship.

And once the younger Durkin and Henstenburg complete their cardiology fellowships, there will be four cardiologists in the family — all of them at St. Luke’s.

Matthew Durkin is the son of Dr. Raymond Durkin, chair of cardiovascular medicine for St. Luke’s, and both are nephews to Dr. Michael Durkin, a general cardiologist at St. Luke’s. (Henstenburg’s mother is Raymond and Michael Durkin’s sister.)

Having two doctors in the family isn’t unheard of, but according to St. Luke’s, having four cardiologists in the family is quite rare.

Raymond Durkin, whose specialization is interventional cardiology, said he’s gotten to work with the younger generation a little bit, and it’s been interesting.

“When I’m in the cath lab with the team and the fellow is either my son or my nephew, that is a little odd but it’s fun,” Raymond Durkin said. “I’m used to being with young people who are smart and motivated but when it’s a relation it’s a little bit different.”

He added he hasn’t started calling them Dr. Durkin or Dr. Henstenburg.

“I call fellows by their first names anyway so I call Matt, Matt, and Brian, Brian. It’s funny because all the fellows call me Dr. Durkin so Matt doesn’t know whether to call me Dr. Durkin or Dad, and for Brian, I am Uncle Ray. So again it is a little strange,” he said.

The younger Durkin and Henstenburg have been connected since they were little, but from a slight distance.

Matthew Durkin is a Lehigh Valley native and lifelong resident. Henstenburg grew up just outside Philadelphia, in Montgomery County. They often got to see each other growing up on holidays and at gatherings.

Though they both ended up going to medical school at the same time, the cousins said neither knew what the other was doing until after the fact. Both ended up attending medical school in Philadelphia, Durkin at Temple/St. Luke’s School of Medicine and Henstenburg at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine.

“I don’t know when we found out we were both going to medical school,” Henstenburg said. “Then first year you’re studying so much that it’s hard to actually do anything or get together, your schedules are so off.”

Then, without planning it, each had residency matches in the Lehigh Valley, Durkin with St. Luke’s and Henstenburg with Lehigh Valley Health Network.

“We actually live like five minutes from each other so then we started getting together a lot more,” Henstenburg said.

Just as doing so much of their schooling and training near each other wasn’t part of the plan, picking the same specialization wasn’t something they sat down and hashed out together either, the cousins said.

Matthew Durkin said once he was in medical school, he tried to keep an open mind to other specialties but he eventually decided cardiology was the best fit for him.

“It wasn’t until the end of medical school and early into my residency that I realized that I liked cardiology the most,” he said.

Henstenburg said he also looked closely at surgery and internal medicine but ultimately decided that the amount of subspecialization available within cardiology was really appealing to him. Both Matthew Durkin and Henstenburg said they plan on working in general cardiology once their fellowships are complete.

Raymond Durkin said he didn’t push his son or nephew toward following him, at least not at first. He added that it wasn’t beyond his wildest dreams that his son or nephew would pursue cardiology, but it wasn’t what he expected either.

“Education was just valued in our family and I think a lot of them just migrated toward medicine,” Raymond Durkin said. “I was happy, I was surprised. But with my brother and I being cardiologists they did have exposure, so I wasn’t shocked.”

Raymond Durkin said he’s glad they matched with St. Luke’s for the fellowship program.

“I think we have a great fellowship, it’s my bias,” he said. “We train people well clinically, they also get involved in academic endeavors, so certainly I would like to see them trained in our community.”

Like many medical professions, cardiologists are in high demand and will continue to be in demand for the foreseeable future. The annual deficit between cardiologists entering the workforce and those leaving it is more than 500, according to the American College of Cardiology.

The cardiologist gap is due to multiple factors on both the supply and demand sides.

A considerable chunk of cardiologists, more than a fourth, are over the age of 61; at the same time, fewer new cardiologists are entering the field through fellowships, according to the American College of Cardiology.

Heart disease is the top killer for adults in the U.S. and was responsible for nearly 700,000 deaths in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Coronary heart disease, caused by a build-up of cholesterol, is the most common type, affecting about 1 in 20 adults over the age of 20.

This burden is expected to grow, with more than 40% of the U.S. expected to have some form of cardiovascular disease by 2030.

“With the aging demographic of the baby boomers and the fact that people live a long time now, there is a big need for people to give cardiovascular care,” Raymond Durkin said. “There’s only a limited number of training spots available in the country. It’s only about 1,200 a year and that doesn’t meet the need for the country.”

Becoming a doctor isn’t an easy path, and becoming a cardiologist or any other specialized physician takes extra years of training.

“To become a cardiologist, sure you have to be smart enough, but there’s a lot of smart people. What I say it is is endurance,” Raymond Durkin said.

Fellowships are highly competitive. St. Luke’s cardiology fellowship only accepts four new fellows a year, and there are only 12 total.

Fellowships also are intensive. Henstenburg said each month of the fellowship, they are essentially immersed in a different subspecialty of cardiology. Raymond Durkin added that his son will be working the day before Thanksgiving and Henstenburg will work a 24-hour shift from Thanksgiving through Black Friday.

He said he is proud of the two men.

“It really is a lot of endurance and personal sacrifice that you make to be able to be a cardiologist,” Raymond Durkin said. “Being a physician truly is a calling more than a job. You do really have the ability to impact people’s lives. I think that’s a good thing.”