As a cardiac surgeon, I am keenly aware that when performing heart surgery, I am not just operating on an organ. I am caring for a human life. I know from doing many traditional open- heart surgeries that these operations can be tough on patients. It is why I am passionate about robotic cardiac surgery. Using a robot to perform heart surgery can make an enormous difference in how much impact the surgery has on a person during and after their operation. But robotic surgery is just a tool. And like every other surgical tool, going back to the first scalpel, it is dependent on practice and a skilled user to achieve the best results. That is why I strive to be the best robotic cardiac surgeon I can be. I know that surgical excellence is rooted in one basic principle, which is to improve on the current way of doing things by making surgery safer and easier for the patient.