Prof. Joanna (Jo) Dukes-McEwan

Jo is currently Professor of Veterinary Cardiology at the University of Liverpool Small Animal Teaching Hospital (UK), where she has worked since 2004, with promotion to personal chair in 2016.  She is head of the cardiology service, which includes 1other senior cardiologist, 3 cardiology residents working towards the ECVIM-CA Cardiology Diploma, for which Jo is programme director, a cardiology intern and a cardiology veterinary nurse.   

Most of Jo’s time is spent in the clinics, seeing cases, teaching cardiology to veterinary students, and training cardiology residents. Her research interests include canine and feline cardiomyopathies, echocardiography, cardiac genetics and cardiac biomarkers.  For her dilated cardiomyopathy research, she currently is working with the Great Dane community in the UK, with research funding from the Kennel Club Charitable Trust and the Great Dane Breed Council. She is a member of the writing group for the American Society of Echocardiography for Guidelines for Acquisition and Quantitation of Transthoracic Two-Dimensional and M-mode Echocardiograms in the Dog and Cat.  

Jo graduated with Honours from the University of Glasgow in 1986.  She has worked in general mixed practice in Hereford and Canterbury and small animal first opinion and referral practice in Glasgow. Her academic career included posts as a house physician and a residency at the University of Glasgow, where she was first inspired to specialise in veterinary cardiology although this residency also included neurology in which she was awarded a Master of Veterinary Medicine degree. She then had a temporary lectureship at the University of Edinburgh (1994-5), where she later did her PhD and a post-doc in studies of dilated cardiomyopathy in Newfoundland dogs (1996 – 2002). She briefly returned to Glasgow as a Senior Lecturer in Cardiology in 2002, before settling at the University of Liverpool. 

She holds both the RCVS (1992) and ECVIM-CA (2003) Diplomas in cardiology, and is an EBVS and RCVS recognised Specialist in cardiology. She was awarded Fellowship of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons in 2017, for meritorious contributions to clinical practice. She was awarded the BSAVA Blaine award in 2008, for veterinary cardiology and teaching. Jo was the previous chair of the ECVIM-CA cardiology specialty, serving on the ECVIM-CA board (2018 – 2024). She is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (since 2018).