Pioneer Editorials
An exploration of the history of developments and applications in the field of artificial organs and transplantation.
The End of the Beginning
Originally published in Volume 37 Issue 4 of Artificial Organs, 05 April 2013 The first hemodialysis was done by Pim Kolff on March 15, 1943 in the hospital in Kampen, Holland, and I believe the first in the USA was done at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston,...
Czech Marathon in the Research of Heart Assist Systems and Total Artificial Heart
Originally published in Volume 37 Issue 3 of Artificial Organs, 05 March 2013 This project was initiated by close cooperation between the Department of Cardiac Surgery and the Institute of Pathophysiology, Faculty of Medicine, Purkinje University (Masaryk University...
Beyond a Boundary Between the Scientific Artificial Organ World and the Nonscientific Spiritual World
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 12 of Artificial Organs, 10 December 2012 When I first entered the Department of Surgery, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan in 1960 after an internship in Tokyo, two crazy (I can designate now) senior surgeons had already been...
Myocardial Protection Era: From Valve Surgery to Heart Transplantation
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 11 of Artificial Organs, 05 November 2012 The quest for the ideal method of myocardial protection started in the early days of cardiac surgery. This narrative is an introspection of a lifetime career dedicated to the...
A Bumpy Road to Maintenance Hemodialysis
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 10 of Artificial Organs, 04 October 2012 After completing my internship, I got my first position as a scientific assistant at the medical clinic of the University of Munich in April 1960. Because there were many more candidates...
Refusal of and Overcoming the Ipse Dixit Philosophy
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 9 of Artificial Organs, 11 September 2012 THE PHILOSOPHY When I was a young student of the classics in high school, I was negatively impressed by the statement Ipse dixit (meaning: he, himself said it), which, by reaction,...
First Successful Bridge to Transplantation With the Total Artificial Heart
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 8 of Artificial Organs, 06 August 2012 It is an honor for me to be labeled “pioneer.” In my case, this meant taking the risk of doing something new. The risk was failure, but I was so caught up in caring for patients that the...
My Addiction: The Artificial Kidney, The Rise and Fall of Dialysis
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 7 of Artificial Organs, 04 July 2012 In 1956, over half a century ago, I saw my first dialysis. It is difficult to believe that any other specialty in medicine could have offered a more stimulating, exciting, or rewarding...
Dr. René Favaloro
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 6 of Artificial Organs, 04 June 2012 I first learned of Dr. René Favaloro (Fig. 1) in early 1984 when I had been diagnosed with coronary artery disease. I studied the literature and sought to learn which surgical procedure...
How the Dream of an “Artificial Heart” Was Realized in Japan
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 5 of Artificial Organs, 09 May 2012 THE DAWN OF ARTIFICIAL HEART RESEARCH IN JAPAN In 1950, the Soviet Union succeeded in achieving “Universe Flight,” and the American President John Kennedy promoted the national project...
My Fortuitous Encounter With Dialysis Therapy
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 4 of Artificial Organs, 10 April 2012 Real dialysis pioneers, such as John Jacob Abel, Geog Haas, Willem Johan Kolff, Nils Alwall, Georg Ganter, Arnold M. Seligman, Howard A. Frank, Jacob Fine, and others, are all deceased by...
Nephrology: The Flywheel of Medicine During the Last 60 Years
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 3 of Artificial Organs, 06 March 2012 My career trajectory in nephrology started already during my medical studies when I learned that from more than 150 L of glomerular filtrate, only about less than 1% is finally...
Brazilian Pioneers in Artificial Organs and Heart Surgery
Originally published in Volume 36 Issue 1 of Artificial Organs, 18 January 2012 The University of Minnesota played a chief role in the development of modern heart surgery. It was there that Dr. Walton Lillehei carried out the first procedure with cross circulation. In...
The Quest for a Solution
Originally published in Volume 35 Issue 8 of Artificial Organs, 15 August 2011 As described in the Design News Engineering Achievement Award, I was considered an engineer for the long haul as I began working on artificial heart technology in 1966 while employed at...
The Hypo/Hypertension Quandary
Originally published in Volume 35 Issue 6 of Artificial Organs, 14 June 2011 The term “Pioneer” indicates substantial experience (“vintage”) and presumes enhanced perspective. In thinking about how I might contribute to this series, I came to the conclusion that one...
Wrestling Uremia in War and Peace
Originally published in Volume 35 Issue 5 of Artificial Organs, 20 May 2011 This narrative, to some extent a career retrospective, reflects my continuing interest in the interaction of dialysis technology and the clinical disorders it is designed to treat rather than...
Recollections of the Early Years of Heart Transplantation and the Total Artificial Heart
Originally published in Volume 35 Issue 4 of Artificial Organs, 19 April 2011 Finding a reliable substitute for the human heart remains a goal of modern-day surgical researchers. I am fortunate to have been involved in much of the early work in this area and would...
A Nephrologist by Accident: A Life Obsession
When Belding H. Scribner, in 1960, demonstrated that lost kidney function could be repeatedly replaced by Willem J. Kolff’s life-sustaining artificial kidney, the disciplines of Nephrology and Artificial Organs were born.
An Odyssey in Mechanical Circulatory Support
In 1967, I was a clinical associate in the Cardiac Surgery Branch of the National Heart Institute. I had already been working on mechanical heart development for 7 years.
Pioneer Series Editorials in Artificial Organs
The field of artificial organs has had a very rich history of accomplishments that we have all benefited from as researchers, developers, clinicians, corporations, and most importantly patients.