Michael
Ellis DeBakey is internationally recognized as a pioneer
of modern medicine. An ingenious medical inventor
and innovator, a gifted and dedicated teacher, a premier
surgeon, and an international medical statesman, Dr.
DeBakey is relentlessly pursuing new avenues in which
modern technology can be applied to the practice of
healing and saving lives.
This prolific surgeon and humanitarian has performed
more than 60,000 cardiovascular procedures and has
trained thousands of surgeons who practice around
the world. In 1976, his students founded the Michael
E. DeBakey International Surgical Society. His name
is affixed to a number of organizations, centers for
learning, and projects devoted to medical education
and health education for the general public.
Dr.
DeBakey has received numerous honorary degrees from
prestigious colleges and universities, as well as
innumerable awards from educational institutions,
professional and civic organizations, and governments
worldwide. In 1969, he received the highest honor
a United States citizen can receive - the Presidential
Medal of Freedom with Distinction. In 1987, President
Ronald Reagan awarded the National Medal of Science
to DeBakey.
During
this first year in Houston, Dr. DeBakey was admitting
his private patients to Hermann Hospital and The Methodist
Hospital, an old building located on Main Street close
to downtown. His relationship with the Methodist administration
and nurses grew warm. The hospital's administrator,
Ted Bowen, allowed Dr. DeBakey to create a new type
of ward at the hospital, an intensive care unit with
nurses specially trained by the surgeon and cardiologists
on staff. It was a radical idea, so radical in fact
that within weeks other surgeons were asking Dr. DeBakey
if their patients could be admitted to his unit. In
1953 the hospital decided to move to a new facility
in the Texas Medical Center.The years 1953-54 marked
a turning point in cardiovascular surgery. Working
at home on his wife's sewing machine, Dr. DeBakey
constructed the first Dacron artificial artery to
replace the damaged segments of artery. In 1953, Dr.
DeBakey began operating on the aorta, and in a series
of operations he brought heart surgery into a new
age. He completed the first successful removal and
graft replacement of an aneurysm (a swelling caused
by weakness in the artery wall) on the descending
aorta. Also in 1953, Dr. DeBakey performed the first
successful endarterectomy, or removal of a blockage
of the carotid artery, the main artery of the neck
which carries blood to the brain, demonstrating an
effective treatment for stroke. In early 1954, he
performed a successful resection and graft on the
ascending aorta, using a heart-lung machine developed
in his laboratory. Later in 1954, he performed another
successful resection and graft on the section of the
aorta which curves over the top of the heart. He had
shown that the diseases of the aorta could be successfully
treated by surgery.
In
the early 1960s, Dr. DeBakey began a warm relationship
with President Lyndon Johnson. The President tried
to persuade him to join his administration as Secretary
of Health, Education and Welfare, but the surgeon
respectfully declined and offered instead to serve
as a consultant. Dr. DeBakey worked a great deal on
legislation with the President and legislators. Knowing
that Medicare would be of benefit to the elderly,
he supported it and encouraged President Johnson to
get the legislation passed; it was very unpopular
with many other physicians. Johnson became his patient,
and secretly came to Houston for examinations. Dr.
DeBakey's statesmanship was very much in evidence
in 1968. Baylor University College of Medicine was
in a financial crisis. He proposed that the college
of medicine separate itself from Baylor University
in Waco and establish a board of trustees composed
of Houston business and civic leaders. With the support
of the university and the Southern Baptist Convention,
the medical school received a charter from the State
of Texas. Dr. DeBakey became the school's first president
and, with a new and committed board of trustees, $30
million was raised and the school's debt cancelled.
Dr. DeBakey began recruiting some of the nation's
most talented physicians, researchers and administrators
to the school. Twenty years after he came to what
he would later call a "third-rate school" he was now
head of a medical college that was destined to become
one of the very best in the nation.
Michael
Ellis DeBakey is internationally recognized as a pioneer
of modern medicine. An ingenious medical inventor
and innovator, a gifted and dedicated teacher, a premier
surgeon, and an international medical statesman, Dr.
DeBakey is relentlessly pursuing new avenues in which
modern technology can be applied to the practice of
healing and saving lives.
Dr.
DeBakey has received numerous honorary degrees from
prestigious colleges and universities, as well as
innumerable awards from educational institutions,
professional and civic organizations, and governments
worldwide. In 1969, he received the highest honor
a United States citizen can receive - the Presidential
Medal of Freedom with Distinction. In 1987, President
Ronald Reagan awarded the National Medal of Science
to DeBakey. 
During
this first year in Houston, Dr. DeBakey was admitting
his private patients to Hermann Hospital and The Methodist
Hospital, an old building located on Main Street close
to downtown. His relationship with the Methodist administration
and nurses grew warm. The hospital's administrator,
Ted Bowen, allowed Dr. DeBakey to create a new type
of ward at the hospital, an intensive care unit with
nurses specially trained by the surgeon and cardiologists
on staff. It was a radical idea, so radical in fact
that within weeks other surgeons were asking Dr. DeBakey
if their patients could be admitted to his unit. In
1953 the hospital decided to move to a new facility
in the Texas Medical Center.The years 1953-54 marked
a turning point in cardiovascular surgery. Working
at home on his wife's sewing machine, Dr. DeBakey
constructed the first Dacron artificial artery to
replace the damaged segments of artery. In 1953, Dr.
DeBakey began operating on the aorta, and in a series
of operations he brought heart surgery into a new
age. He completed the first successful removal and
graft replacement of an aneurysm (a swelling caused
by weakness in the artery wall) on the descending
aorta. Also in 1953, Dr. DeBakey performed the first
successful endarterectomy, or removal of a blockage
of the carotid artery, the main artery of the neck
which carries blood to the brain, demonstrating an
effective treatment for stroke. In early 1954, he
performed a successful resection and graft on the
ascending aorta, using a heart-lung machine developed
in his laboratory. Later in 1954, he performed another
successful resection and graft on the section of the
aorta which curves over the top of the heart. He had
shown that the diseases of the aorta could be successfully
treated by surgery. 
In
the early 1960s, Dr. DeBakey began a warm relationship
with President Lyndon Johnson. The President tried
to persuade him to join his administration as Secretary
of Health, Education and Welfare, but the surgeon
respectfully declined and offered instead to serve
as a consultant. Dr. DeBakey worked a great deal on
legislation with the President and legislators. Knowing
that Medicare would be of benefit to the elderly,
he supported it and encouraged President Johnson to
get the legislation passed; it was very unpopular
with many other physicians. Johnson became his patient,
and secretly came to Houston for examinations. Dr.
DeBakey's statesmanship was very much in evidence
in 1968. Baylor University College of Medicine was
in a financial crisis. He proposed that the college
of medicine separate itself from Baylor University
in Waco and establish a board of trustees composed
of Houston business and civic leaders. With the support
of the university and the Southern Baptist Convention,
the medical school received a charter from the State
of Texas. Dr. DeBakey became the school's first president
and, with a new and committed board of trustees, $30
million was raised and the school's debt cancelled.
Dr. DeBakey began recruiting some of the nation's
most talented physicians, researchers and administrators
to the school. Twenty years after he came to what
he would later call a "third-rate school" he was now
head of a medical college that was destined to become
one of the very best in the nation. 