Keshava Rajagopal, MD
Thoracic Surgery (Cardiothoracic Vascular Surgery) · Houston, TXNPI 1295993889
Payments from drug & device makers
Across 109 payments — averaging $72.54 each. Meals, travel, consulting and speaking fees, gifts and royalties reported by drug and device makers.
- Abbott$2K
- Abiomed$1K
- Paladin Technology Solutions$1K
- Medtronic$910
- Baxter Healthcare$365
- Arthrex$292
- plus $1K from 9 others
What the payments were for
- Travel & lodging$2,75735%
- Food & beverage$5,15065%
Most of this is food and beverage — typically meals provided during product presentations at a clinic or hospital. Nationally that is the single largest category of reported payments by count.
General payments by program year
Who reported the general payments
Companies are grouped under their corporate parent — a single manufacturer often files under several CMS reporting entities. Research and ownership payments are counted separately and are not in this table.
| Company | Payments | Total |
|---|---|---|
| Abbott | 35 | $2,465 |
| Abiomed | 20 | $1,489 |
| Paladin Technology Solutions | 8 | $1,312 |
| Medtronic(2 entities) | 18 | $910 |
| Baxter Healthcare | 2 | $365 |
| Arthrex | 3 | $292 |
| Atricure, Inc. | 7 | $229 |
| Edwards Lifesciences | 2 | $181 |
| Boston Scientific | 5 | $148 |
| ZOLL Services LLC (a/k/a ZOLL Lifecor Corp) | 3 | $147 |
| Johnson & Johnson(2 entities) | 2 | $140 |
| Endologix LLC | 1 | $106 |
| Intuitive Surgical | 1 | $77 |
| Smith+Nephew | 1 | $26 |
| Stryker | 1 | $20 |
What the payments were tied to
Products named in the reported payments. Only payments of $100 or more are attributed here — the typical reported payment nationally is a meal worth about $16, and listing those product-by-product would be noise.
- THORATEC HEARTMATE 3 LVAS IMPLANT KIT$1,566
- Impella$633
- FLOSEAL$245
- Mosaic$155
- CentriMag$125
- ETHICON$125
- PREVELEAK$120
- AFX2 Bifurcated Endograft System$106
How this compares
$7,907 in reported general payments places this provider in the 50th percentile of 424 thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Texas.
See all thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) providers in Texas →
Medicare billing
What this is not: this is the amount Original Medicare Part B allowed for services this provider billed in 2024. It is not their income. It excludes Medicare Advantage — now more than half of all Medicare enrollment — along with Medicaid and all commercial insurance, and it is gross practice revenue before staff, rent, supplies and malpractice premiums. CMS also suppresses any figure covering ten or fewer patients, so low-volume providers appear smaller than they are.
Other thoracic surgery (cardiothoracic vascular surgery) in Houston
- Michael ReardonHouston$2.7M
- Robert RipleyHouston$817K
- Danny RamzyHouston$620K
- Marc MoonHouston$476K
- Wayne HofstetterHouston$469K
- Eric PedenHouston$465K
- Gabriel LoorHouston$410K
- Igor GregoricHouston$359K
- Thomas MacgillivrayHouston$330K
- Min KimHouston$326K
Where these figures come from
- Payments: CMS Open Payments, program years 2019–2025 (publication P06302026_06032026).
- Billing: Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners, data year 2024. Original Medicare Part B only.
- Identity: NPPES NPI Registry, July 2026.