He was born in 1954 in the village of Alatarla, which is located in the Oltu district of Erzurum. He completed his primary education in his village, his secondary education at Oltu Secondary School, and his high school education at Haydarpaşa High School in Istanbul. In 1978, he completed his studies at the Cerrahpaşa Faculty of Medicine. Between 1979 and 1984, he served as a Research Assistant at the Department of Chest, Cardiovascular Surgery of the Atatürk University Faculty of Medicine. He completed his military service at GATA. He resumed his position as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Chest, Cardiovascular Surgery of the Atatürk University Faculty of Medicine in Erzurum at the conclusion of 1987, following his tenure as a specialist at the Turkish High Specialisation Hospital. He was appointed as an Associate Professor in 1990 and promoted to Professor in 1995. He conducted research at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation in the United States in 1992 and at St. Thomas Hospital in London in 1989. In 1988, he conducted the first coronary bypass surgery in Erzurum. In 1993, the TürkKalp Foundation recognised his significant contributions to the transformation of Erzurum into a cardiac centre by awarding him the "Assoc. Prof. Edip Kürklü Award." From 2008 to 2016, he was the Rector of Atatürk University. He was the Founding President of the Turkish University Union and the President of the Silk Road Universities Union (ESRUC) during his tenure as Rector.. He was awarded honorary doctorates from Tbilisi Medical University (Georgia), Karaganda Bolashak University (Kazakhstan), and Nakhchivan State University (Azerbaijan) in recognition of his university collaborations in international disciplines. In 2021, he resigned from Atatürk University and commenced employment as a faculty member in the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery at the Faculty of Medicine of Üsküdar University.