Cardiothoracic surgery at the Mount Sinai Hospital.

Beginning in the early years of the twentieth century, there has been a continuing record of significant contribution made by Mount Sinai physicians to the surgical management of thoracic and cardiovascular pathology. The availability of intratracheal anesthesia, a method developed at this institution, was the sine qua non which made it possible for surgeons to perform thoracic, and later, cardiac procedures. Of great importance to medicine in general, and surgery in particular, were the investigations of two Mount Sinai physicians that made the transfusion of blood safe, and the modern blood bank a reality.

Historical vignettes concerning cardiopulmonary bypass without homologous blood and perfusion hypothermia.

The development of a predictable means of carrying out CPB employing a nonhemic prime with the potential for performance of the entire cardiac operation devoid of HB and, second, the extraordinary advantage of perfusion hypothermia in establishing conditions permitting a safe period of circulatory arrest are two important components of contemporary perfusion methodology. These advances--and others yet to be--represent a continuum of the vision and accomplishments of John Gibbon who--with his lovely wife, Mary, and distinguished colleagues--made clinical CPB a reality 50 years ago.