Howaida G. El-said MD, PhD

Dr. Howaida El-Said is the director of the cardiac catheterization laboratory at Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego and a clinical professor of pediatrics at UC San Diego. She is one of only two ABIM-certified adult congenital heart disease specialists in San Diego, Imperial and Riverside counties.

Dr. El-Said completed her pediatrics residency, pediatric cardiology fellowship, imaging fellowship and interventional pediatric cardiology fellowship at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. She trained under the founder and father of interventional pediatric cardiology, Dr. Charles Mullins, which gave her vast exposure to the most complex adult congenital heart disease (ACHD) cases.

After completing her medical training in 2000, Dr. El-Said became an associate pediatric cardiologist at Baylor before coming to San Diego. She performs close to half of the diagnostic and interventional procedures at the Rady Children's cardiac catheterization laboratory. Thirty percent of her cardiac catheterization procedures are ACHD cases, including percutaneous valve implantations.