Dr. Sushil Vasudeo Karmarkar, MD

My Biography

I was born in India and emigrated to the United States with my parents when I was 13 years old. I grew up and went to high school in Wheaton, Illinois, a Chicago suburb. My wonderful wife and I have two lovely children. Our son is in college and daughter is in high school. As a family we enjoy traveling, hiking, camping, skiing, or just hanging out together. I like reading, listening to music, and physical fitness. I exercise nearly every day so I can talk to the patients about the benefits of exercise from personal experience and with confidence. More recently, I have tried my hand at writing poetry and short stories. When I have more free time, I would like to resume pencil drawing and sketching, which I enjoyed much in high school.

When I was young, I was always drawn to the life sciences and was fascinated by how organisms functioned. I was also curious to understand how health and disease affected not just biologic functions, but our lives. In college, my interests …became further solidified and I was convinced that medicine was in my future. During medical school and then in post-graduate training I started to understand life from a healing perspective and also learned of some of the limitations of medicine. Today, several years into my practice, I feel blessed to have the privilege of being a part of so many patients' lives. I feel extremely grateful to my patients who continue to enrich me as a person through their experiences and mould me into a better human being.

During internal medicine residency we are exposed to various medical specialties as we rotate through them as part of our rigorous training. I settled on cardiology as I found the subject matter dynamic and quite diverse. Cardiology spans the entire spectrum of medical practice, from high-tech diagnostic and interventional procedures, to office-based preventive applications, to the connection of heart disease and mind-body medicine, to its relationship to spirituality. Besides, heart disease is the number one killer in the developed world (but not for our fortunate Northern California Kaiser Permanente members!), so it is exciting to see that even small increments in progress can impact a large number of people.

While I was doing my internal medicine residency and cardiology fellowship at Kaiser Permanente Hospital, Los Angeles (affiliated with the University of Southern California), I became enamored with the concept of pre-paid healthcare. Our physicians make medical decisions based on what they think is in the best interest of the patient. Kaiser Permanente’s doctors and hospitals have their goals aligned in providing the best possible needed health care to our members. This is the best model there is for delivering medical care that allows us to go home every day with a clear conscience. The multi-specialty medical group practice, information technology applications, and integrated delivery system gives us instant access to patients' medical information and to other physicians for consultations. I have never second guessed my decision to join Kaiser Permanente and have never ever doubted our goal of improving the health of the community through high quality preventive programs and state-of-the-art acute care in hospitals that is based on scientific evidence. We also place a great emphasis on patient education, since a better informed patient is a better partner in fight against disease. I not only practice medicine here, but this is the only place I would take my family for their health care.

About Your Appointment

In order to get to get the most out of your consultation or follow-up appointment:

-Please try to arrive at my office about 15 minutes before your appointment. This will allow time for registration and for my staff to get your weight.

-Please bring copies of any important outside records that might be helpful.

-Please bring a list of your current medications and their doses or the actual pill bottles themselves.

-Review the link in the navigation bar called "Preparing for Your Visit" for additional useful