Pioneers of Cardiac Surgery

Floyd D. Loop, MD

Coronary Artery Surgery 405 Floyd D. Loop, MD (b. 1936) René Favaloro and Dudley Johnson were the two surgeons that really popularized coronary artery surgery, but they were not in communication. . . . It just happened in both places at the same time. — On the first coronary artery bypass operations Interviewed March 5, 2003 I was born in Lafayette, Indiana, in 1936. My father was an old-fashioned country doctor, and I used to go around with him to farms and carry his black bag. I had sort of a Huckleberry Finn childhood. It was a very innocent time, and I had a wonderful boyhood. I went to Purdue University after high school because I had a full scholarship , so it was inexpensive. For medical school, my choices were either to stay in the Midwest and attend Indiana University, or to move from the Midwest. I was always seeking something new, so I decided to look at George Washington University, in Washington , D.C., where my father had gone to medical school. I had an uncle who lived in Washington, and I went to see him. He said, “The best way to learn about George Washington University is to go and see the dean.” I pointed out that we had no appointment . My uncle said, “That won’t matter.” So we walked in to see the dean, John Parks, an old football player from the University of Wisconsin, but he was getting ready to go to a commencement. My uncle said, “This young man wants to go to your medical school and would like to meet you.” So the dean invited me into his office and sat down and talked to me for a while. One thing led to another, and I did attend George Washington University. I had a wonderful medical education and had a great clinical exposure there. DC General Hospital was the site of a lot of our clinical activities. After I graduated in 1962, I decided to intern there, because I liked the diversity of practice. After one year of general surgical residency , I was drafted into the air force. I thought that if I went to see a colonel or a general, perhaps he could advise me on where to spend the next two years. They were very affable and talked to me a long time about career opportunities and where I might go to do a little surgery while I was in the air force, but when I got my orders, they said that I was going to Laredo, Texas. I have nothing against Texas, but they had a twenty-five-bed dispensary down there, and I didn’t feel too good about that. Nevertheless , I packed my bags and was ready to go. The professor of surgery at George Washington University, Brian Blades, called me in and said, “Where are you going?” I told him that I was going to Laredo, Texas. He said, “No, you’re not.” He picked up the phone, and within a month I was at Andrews Air Force Base. I was very fortunate when I got to Andrews, because they didn’t have any general surgeons. There was another fellow like me who had only one year of surgical training, and we became the general surgeons, under supervision, of course. We did a lot of surgery over the 406 Pioneers of Cardiac Surgery next two years. I did so much surgery in the air force that I was given a year’s credit of residency training. I went back to George Washington University after I was discharged, and started my third year of residency. One of the chief residents decided to go back into the navy, so I became the chief resident in my third year and consequently gained more experience, again under supervision. I decided at that point that I wanted to go into cardiothoracic surgery. At first I had thought I might like to be a plastic surgeon, but cardiothoracic surgery seemed more challenging. It seemed as if there were more opportunities for research and new procedures. So I talked to Dr. Blades and told him that my plan was to go do research somewhere for a year and to study thoracic surgery in England. He listened very patiently and then said, “You’re not going to do any of that. There’s a new field that is going to start, called coronary artery surgery.” How he knew this, I have no idea. He was a friend of...