Filippo Crea was born in Cosenza, Italy on 19 September 1953.

He graduated from Pisa Medical School with full honours in 1977 and passed the Postgraduate Boards in both Pulmonary and Cardiovascular Diseases, again with full honours, at Pisa Medical School in 1980 and 1983 respectively. During the whole of 1984 he was Research Fellow at the Division of Cardiology of the University of Florida, directed by Professor Richard C. Conti. From 1985 to 1991 he was Honorary Clinical Assistant and then Senior Lecturer and Honorary Consultant at the Cardiovascular Research Unit of the Hammersmith Hospital in London, directed by Professor Attilio Maseri.

He returned to Italy upon his appointment as Chief of the Catheterization Laboratory at the Institute of Cardiology of the Catholic University in Rome. In 2000 he became Associate Professor of Cardiology and Chief of the Intensive and Sub-Intensive Care Unit. In 2001 he became Professor of Cardiology, Director of the Institute of Cardiology and Director of the Postgraduate School in Cardiology at the Catholic University in Rome. From October 2008 to January 2020 he was Director of the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences. Since February 2020 he is Director of The Cardiology Unit of Foundation Agostino Gemelli Hospital and Director of the University Department of Cardiovascular and Pneumological Sciences of the Catholic University of Rome.