On Tuesday, Aug. 28, Radiologist Steve Ferrara, MD, won the Republican primary for the open U.S. House seat in Arizona’s Phoenix-based 9th Congressional District. If elected, Ferrara will be the first radiologist to serve in Congress.
He defeated David Giles, the GOP’s 2016 nominee, and Irina Baroness Von Behr in the primary and will now face former Phoenix mayor Greg Stanton in the general election on Nov. 8.
RADPAC, the American College of Radiology Association’s federal political action committee, took to Twitter to congratulate Ferrara on his win. “Proud to announce that @steveferraramd has been declared the winner of the Republican primary in #AZ9 #CD9,” the tweet read.
Ferrara joined the Navy during the Gulf War in 1991, when he was a senior in college. Since then, he spent 25 years in various capacities in the armed forces—including as a radiologist in Indonesia after the 2004 tsunami and later in Afghanistan, first as a general medical officer with the Army and then as an interventional radiologist at a hospital in Kandahar.
More recently, Ferrara served as a National Academy of Sciences Fellow.
Ferrara believes his career as an interventional radiologist will give him a unique perspective on Capitol Hill.
“Radiologists have a very unique perspective on the healthcare system because we interface with pretty much every other specialty in medicine,” Ferrara said in an earlier interview with Radiology Business. “When I finished my time on Capitol Hill, I became the Navy’s chief medical officer. Some thought an interventional radiologist was a strange choice for that role, but I thought it was an apt choice because radiologists understand both primary care and specialty medicine. And it makes me well-suited to talk about healthcare policy, which is probably our most important domestic issue. In that regard, I think experience in radiology is a huge asset. How many politicians have taken an oath to take care of people and do no harm? Not very many.”
As a senior news writer for TriMed, Subrata covers cardiology, clinical innovation and healthcare business. She has a master’s degree in communication management and 12 years of experience in journalism and public relations.