Interview with Bruce Reitz and Bill Baumgartner on the first Heart Lung Transplant

Varun Puri, MD, MSCI

Moderator

Primary Academic Title

Professor of Surgery, Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine

Clinical Expertise

Lung and esophageal cancers, Lung transplantation

Research Interest

Predictive modeling in lung cancer outcomes and organ donor optimization

Ashish Shah

Moderator

Dr. Ashish S. Shah is the Alfred Blalock Director and Chair of Cardiac Surgery at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He trained at Duke University Medical Center and served on the faculty of The Johns Hopkins Hospital for 10years before joining the faculty at Vanderbilt. 

Sara Shumway

Speaker

Dr. Sara Shumway is currently a Professor of Surgery with tenure at the University of Minnesota. She is Vice Chief of the division of Cardiothoracic Surgery and has been an Associate Program Director in the past. She recently was elected to the University of Minnesota Academy of Clinical Excellence. Dr. Shumway received her MD degree at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, followed by a General Surgery Residency at Vanderbilt University Affiliated Hospitals. She completed an Immunology Fellowship in the Transplantation Biology Section of Sir Peter Medawar in London, England. She did a Cardiac Surgery Fellowship at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. She is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, as well as a member of the American Surgical Association and the Halsted Society. Her areas of expertise include heart transplantation, lung transplantation, and adult cardiac surgery. She has been the surgical director of both the Heart Transplant program and the Lung Transplant program at the University of Minnesota.

Bruce Reitz

Speaker

Bruce A. Reitz is an American cardiothoracic surgeon, best known for leading the first combined heart-lung transplantation in 1981 with pioneer heart transplant surgeon Norman Shumway. He obtained an undergraduate degree at Stanford University (B.S. 1966) a medical degree at Yale Medical School (M.D. 1970) and completed an internship at Johns Hopkins Hospital (1971) and residencies and fellowships at Stanford University Hospital (1972 and 1978) the National Institutes of Health (1974). He joined the surgical faculty at Stanford University (1978) then became chief of cardiac surgery at Johns Hopkins University (1982–92) and Chairman of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery at Stanford (1992–2005). In 1995 he conducted another pioneering operation: the first Heartport procedure, using a device that allows minimally invasive coronary bypass and valve operations. Reitz also played a major role in the resident education program at Stanford, which he reorganized and maintained.

William Baumgartner

Speaker

William A. Baumgartner joined Johns Hopkins’ Cardiac Surgery Division in 1982.  The following year he reinitiated the heart transplant program at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, which grew into one of the leading centers in the surgical treatment of heart failure in the country. For 17 years, he led the Division as the Cardiac Surgeon-in-Charge. Today he serves as the Inaugural Chair of The Academy at Johns Hopkins. Past president of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS), the Southern Thoracic Surgical Association and the International Society of Heart and Lung Transplantation, Dr. Baumgartner has held leadership positions in several other national and international professional organizations, including the position of Executive Director of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery. His research laboratory began investigating neurological protection in cardiac surgery in 1992, resulting in continuous NIH funding for over 25 years. In 2002, he received the Javits Neuroscience Research Investigator Award from the NIH. In 2003 and 2009, he was honored with the Socrates Teacher of the Year Award from the Thoracic Surgery Residents Association. The STS presented him with the Earl Bakken Scientific Research Award in 2008 and the Distinguished Service Award in 2015. Dr. Baumgartner was the Vice Dean for Clinical Affairs and President of the Clinical Practice Association (CPA) of the Johns Hopkins University from 1999-2019. He served as the inaugural JHM Sr. Vice President, Office of Johns Hopkins Physicians from 2011-2018. A graduate of Xavier University and the University of Kentucky Medical School, Dr. Baumgartner received his surgical training at Stanford University Medical Center and remained on the faculty for one year before being recruited to Johns Hopkins. His bibliography includes more than 400 journal articles, book chapters and books.