Training With Heart

If you ask Cindy Blasewitz where her passion lies, she will keep it simple. “Helping and educating people,” she said. “From the onset of my career as a Physician Assistant (PA), I enjoyed adopting new therapies, educating peers and training others on new technologies.”

Cindy began her career with Getinge over 20 years ago as a consultant for Cardiac Surgery (CS). In this role, surgeons and PAs would visit her hospital to learn about the latest in beating heart surgery and endoscopic vessel harvesting (EVH). Cindy was also the harvester in one of the first live Off-pump Coronary Bypass Surgery and EVH webinars sponsored by the company in 2001. 

She then went on to have a critical role in the Clinical Ambassador Program. This program was designed by the CS Product Area to assist the regional sales teams with EVH adoption outside the US. Once the local sales team had contracted EVH with the hospital, a practicing PA would travel to proctor clinicians on the EVH procedure for 1-2 weeks.

“On my full time hiring, I was relocated to England to support the UKI CS sales team as a clinical trainer for EVH,” Cindy said. “It was a great experience and I have been working at Getinge ever since.”

Over the last 11 years, Cindy has been instrumental in the expansion of EVH use. This would not be possible without her passion for Cardiac Surgery.

“To be a trainer, passion is key,” she said. “You have to be passionate about the products you will be working with. It is hard to put in the extra work when you don’t believe in the products or therapies.”

While her role at Getinge began focused strictly on Clinical and Cardiac Surgery Product Training, she now also works very closely with various teams, collaborating to develop pivotal training content for healthcare practitioners, as well as internal stakeholders.

Her passion for educating people has never wavered. Cindy still finds the most fulfillment in the diversity of her role and the close collaboration she experiences with her team.

“I am constantly using my clinical and global experiences to develop material that can assist others in learning about the use of our products and understanding the beneficial therapies they offer,” she said. “This varies from brochures, videos, eLearnings, animations, to a new and exciting EVH Interactive Training Video Game – all of which I have learned to do on the job.”

With this immense collaboration Cindy discovered another passion: engineering.

“My secret passion is to work with the Getinge Cardiac Surgery Research & Development team on ideation and new product development,” she said. “Recognizing how my brain works while assisting in R&D, it’s incredible. Perhaps in another life I would have been an engineer.”

Learn more about Getinge cardiovascular and cardiothoracic products and solutions >>>