Welcome, Dr. Bezzina

Thoracic surgeon Lance Bezzina, DO, of Bryan Heart Cardiovascular Surgery grew up in Detroit. He says, “I was fortunate. I’ve always known I wanted to be a doctor, but I didn’t know exactly which field I wanted to go into until I was in general surgery residency. A mentor guided me into cardiothoracic surgery.”

As a thoracic surgeon, Dr. Bezzina performs various kinds of surgeries in the chest, including anything from the top of the diaphragm to the neck. He most often operates on the heart and the lungs.

While the technical nature of cardiothoracic surgery first attracted him, Dr. Bezzina views his work as an art form, a 50/50 combination of science and art. He says, “It’s beautiful to watch the heart work after you’ve operated on it. I think it’s the only organ that you can actually watch as it functions. You can see the change.”

Dr. Bezzina approaches his patients the way he would want to be treated if the situation were reversed. He says, “I know this sounds like a cliché, but I try to treat people the way I would treat a member of my own family. My guiding principle is that at the end of the patient-physician interaction, both of us should feel better. No matter what news we have to break, we have to get a plan together and hopefully, at the end of the interaction both of us feel better than we did at the beginning.”

Dr. Bezzina graduated from the Pikeville College of Osteopathic Medicine, Kentucky, in 2005. He completed his internship and general surgery residency at Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine, East Lansing, and continued his training in a thoracic surgery residency at Texas Heart Institute/Baylor College of Medicine, Houston.

Dr. Bezzina is certified by the American Osteopathic Board of Surgery in thoracic surgery.

Dr. Bezzina and his wife, Kate, are both from the Midwest and lived in Iowa 10 years before coming to Lincoln. During their free time, the couple enjoys international travel. n

To watch an introductory video about Dr. Bezzina, go to bryanhealth.org/DrBezzina.