Experimental Surgery: Where Are We Going?

Abstract

The United States has a long history of leadership in cardiovascular surgery, from the pioneering efforts of Blalock, Harken, Gibbon, Lillehei, and Bailey in the 1940s and 1950s to the work of Debakey, Cooley, Shumway, and Kantrowitz in the 1960s and Rastelli and Olsen in the 1970s. The experimental and clinical literature is filled with United States surgeons developing breakthrough techniques, many of which are still in use today. The works of our own Markowitz awardees are a litany of the contributions of cardiovascular research surgeons. Recently, the focus has shifted, I believe, away from the United States to other countries such as Japan, with surgeons such as Kuno, or France, with the renowned group led by Carpartier.