Open-heart surgeryIn 1953, a heart-lung machine designed by Dr. John Heysham Gibbon was used to successfully complete the first open-heart surgery, on patient Cecelia Bavolek, demonstrating that an artificial device can temporarily mimic the functions of the heart. Improved versions allow surgeons today to perform bypass surgery and heart transplants. He built the first experimental heart-lung machine or pump oxygenator in 1937 that used two roller pumps and able to replace the heart and lung action of a cat for 25 minutes. By the late 1940s, with financial and technical support from IBM President Thomas J. Watson, Gibbon produced an improved device which cascading the blood down a thin sheet of film for oxygenation to prevent damage blood corpuscles.« |
