The Mentorship Award recognizes a senior physician or sonographer who has demonstrated exceptional mentorship within ASE. Unlike other awards, the Mentorship Award specifically acknowledges individuals who helped younger members advance within this Society and thus cultivated ASE’s future leaders.
Congratulations 2026 Awardee, Vince Sorrell, MD, FASE
Dr. Sorrell was recruited to University of Kentucky (UK) Gill Heart & Vascular Institute in 2011 to develop the Advanced Cardiovascular Imaging (ACI) Program at UKMC and the GHVI and was honored with the investiture of the first and only Anthony N. DeMaria Endowed Professorship.
He has been involved with education throughout his career serving as the Associate Program Director or Program Director for Cardiology, Echocardiography and Advanced CV Imaging Fellowship Programs for 30 years. He received the highest teaching award from ASE when he was awarded the 10th annual Richard Popp Excellence in Teaching Award in 2010 for education and mentorship.
His work has involved pioneering efforts in contrast echocardiography, 3-dimentional echocardiography, nuclear cardiology, 1st-generation Cardiovascular MRI and CT, robotic and minimally invasive valve surgery, and more. During his 15+ years at UK, the ACI program has become nationally recognized as one of the top clinical, research, and training programs in the US, currently performing more than 2500 exams / year. He was the Program Director for the Cardiology Fellowship Training Program for 7 years and currently holds the Position as Professor and Chief for the Division of CV Medicine.
Among his many achievements, he holds Fellowships from the ACC, SCMR, SCCT, and ASE and was awarded with an honorary fellowship from the American College of Physicians. He has published more than 300 peer-reviewed scientific abstracts and papers, 100 book chapters, four textbooks, numerous electronic educational materials and is an active writer and creator of board examination questions. He was fundamental in the creation of the Critical Care Echocardiography Review Course and the CCE Board Exam. He is a founding member of the CCE Council for the ASE and currently serves on committees assigned to preparing many new guideline documents including the recently published POCUS Nomenclature and Standardization of Adult Echo Reporting. He is a member of the ASE Publications Committee, Guideline Writing Committee, and Scientific App and Innovation team. He is the Physician Course Director for Echo Florida 2026 and Chair, Regional Live Course Working Group for ASE 2027.
He published the 1st 3D Echo Atlas with Navin C. Nanda and was an investigator working with the 1st echo Contrast agent. He worked with the 1st research and the 1st clinically active Da Vinci Robotic Surgical device and published many of the highly cited reports on this surgical system which is now widely used in cardiac surgery. He performed and reported on many first-in-human procedures which were often coordinated with the availability of news reporters and visiting surgeons from across the US. He facilitated the growth of intraoperative echo monitoring during mitral valve surgery to cardiologists and CT surgeons across the globe and performed TEE or TOE in many institutions.
During his tenure at the University of Arizona, he was active in innovation and clinical research and was part of a team who worked with the FDA on the first Total Artificial Heart still widely used as a means for mechanical circulatory support. He was recognized as an Imaging Expert for the NIH-funded North American Registry for ARVD/C which resulted in the Task Force Criteria for diagnosing this rare cardiomyopathy. He was an active researcher on Sudden Cardiac Death investigations and part of the team that proved the value of ‘Hands-only CPR’.
His innovative approach to cardiovascular MRI imaging in swine models during sustained ventricular fibrillation remains today as the working model for our understanding of the dynamic changes that the heart undergoes during cardiac arrhythmias and resuscitation.
He also served as the Cardiology Consultant for the Clinical Research arm at BioMedical Systems which provided the cardiovascular research oversight for the class action lawsuit for the Fen-Phen settlement. His report on the actual cardiac damage in a blinded manner guided the multibillion-dollar award settlement. He was appointed as the Director, Clinical Research at the Sarver Heart Center in prior to moving to the University of Kentucky.
He currently serves in the role as the Co-Chair for the UK Cardiovascular Research Priority Area and is a member of the Research Advisory Committee. He has published, on average, 1 PubMed-cited publication every other month without exception for >25 years.
While at UK, he was recognized as the site-PI for 1 of only 35 late-breaking clinical trials at the American Heart Association 2021 scientific sessions (PRECISE; an advanced AI-algorithm for cardiac CT that we helped implement) and was recognized as a Top US Recruiting site.
He is a lifetime member of Who’s Who in America and Best Physicians in America. He has over 12,800 followers on X/twitter and is the Editor in Chief for CASE: CV Imaging Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography.
He is recognized as a national leader in Valvular Heart Disease education and was invited to be the ACC author for their 2019-2025 Collaborative Maintenance Pathway (MOC Program and ACCEL Author) for Prosthetic Heart Valves, EchoSAP, and CathSAP, used to certify future generations of cardiologists.
His current work is aimed at a establishing a transformative approach to academic clinical and translational research through mentorship, resource support, multispecialty collaboration, and strategic state-wide networks that recognize and create means to attenuate disparities in clinical CV outcomes.
The sum of this work lead to his membership in the prestigious Association of University Cardiologists in 2019 – a venerable list of elite, academic cardiologists.
2026 Awardee: Vince Sorrell, MD, FASE