Dr. Erminia Guarneri, the medical director of both the Scripps Center for Integrative Medicine and Healing Hearts Program, treats the whole patient - mind, body and soul. (photo/alandeckerphoto.com)

Listening to the heart means hearing more than a rhythm. And treating the patient means more to Dr. Erminia Guarneri than healing an ailing body part. Guarneri, 44, treats the whole patient — mind, body and soul.

A licensed interventional cardiologist, Guarneri is the medical director of both the Scripps Center for Integrative Medicine and Healing Hearts Program. The New York native arrived here in 1995 to study cardiovascular procedures. “The reason I came to Scripps Clinic is because the stent, the metal sleeve that goes into the arteries, was invented here.” Expecting to train for a year and return to New York University Medical Center, she instead discovered the clinic progressive and found La Jolla is a “phenomenal place to live.”

“She was so good I kept her and she became my colleague,” says Dr. Paul Teirstein, director of interventional cardiology at Scripps. “She is a very intelligent, hardworking and creative cardiologist who connects with her patients in a very sincere way.”

When Teirstein hired her, she already was an accomplished doctor. She has her master’s degree in bioengineering from Polytechnic Institute of New York and her medical degree from SUNY Medical Center in New York, where she graduated No. 1 in her class. She served her internship and residency at Cornell Medical Center, where she was chief medical resident, and served cardiology fellowships at both New York University Medical Center and at Scripps Clinic.

Her first few years at Scripps were devoted solely to repairing coronary arteries. “I was always down in the cath lab doing procedures,” she says. “After about eight months it became clear to me that we were doing these procedures and sending people out without the tools to make change to keep them healthy.

“It was very much a disconnect for me to do a procedure on a patient and then go visit them in the ICU. I would have just opened an artery, and they would be sitting there eating a roast beef and mayo sandwich.”

After seeing the same people return to the ICU, and finding that they thought they were eating healthy “by substituting ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter,’” Guarneri decided to do something. “The traditional practice is for physicians to sit around and wait for people to have heart attacks,” she says. “The reality is you can prevent cardiovascular disease. The whole birth of the integrative medicine center is really to be aggressive about detection and prevention. We needed a program as aggressive for prevention and early detection of heart disease as we have for intervention.”

Teirstein says Guarneri is still taking care of patients but “now is treating the whole person. She is one of the most successful doctors I’ve seen in San Diego,” he says. “She created from nothing a program that integrates physicians and others from a wide variety of disciplines to treat patients. It’s hard to emphasize how successful this has been.”

The center, opened in 1997 and staffed with people handpicked by Guarneri, incorporates various methods to change the lives of cardiac patients and those at risk.

Treatment regimes can include acupuncture, biofeedback, guided imagery and hypnosis, herbal pharmacy, herbal and nutritional supplement consultation, healing touch treatment and professional training, massage, nutrition consultation, cooking classes, stress reduction, yoga and meditation, kundalini yoga, watsu water massage and much more. “It’s not only what you eat,” Guarneri says, “It’s also who you eat it with.”

Barbara Shelov, 68, has been a part of the Healing Hearts program for about five years. She joined after a second operation. “Fifteen years ago I had a heart attack. They did angioplasty and I was fine,” Shelov says. “I lived my life like it never happened.” That landed her back in the emergency room with a blocked artery in 1999. “Dr. Guarneri comes over, puts her hand on me and explains to me they are putting a stent in. She was so deliciously calm, I was able to relax.”

While Shelov was still in the hospital the doctor met with her husband and told him about the new program for healing. “He told her to sign me right up,” Shelov says. “She has been working with me all along.”

Shelov can’t say enough about the positive impact Guarneri and her staff have made in her life, teaching her to live a healthy lifestyle. Recently she’s also relied on it to bring her through difficult times associated with a diagnosis of ovarian cancer. “The program teaches how to live day by day,” she says. “We should be mindful of this moment and don’t need to worry about the past or future moment. Dr. Guarneri makes us feel confident; she’s a very calming woman. I feel very blessed she came into my life.”

Guarneri’s mother died at 43 of heart disease. While this may have had something to do with her choice of specialty, Guarneri says she always knew she would become a doctor. “I was aware at a young age of how devastating heart disease can be,” she says. This is why it’s important for young women to know their family history. “In addition,” Guarneri says, “know yourself. Where are you? Check yourself out. I have women at age 36 with coronary stents.”

Guarneri doesn’t just talk a healthy life. “I actually live my life by what I teach. I don’t believe you can teach it if you don’t live it.” she says. “When you live a healthy life, you look younger.”

Guarneri, of Italian descent, is a vegetarian who is active in yoga, hiking and traveling. She takes the time to vacation and give herself mental breaks. Her philosophy is to work hard and play hard. With a second home in Hawaii, she chose not to marry and have children because of her dedication to medicine. Her patients are her family and feed her passion for what she does.

“People come out so much better,” she says of participants. “If we leave something behind on this planet, we’ve accomplished something.”