Famous Surgeons

Rand Paul, a lifelong Republican, dedicated his career to advancing Libertarian values. He fights government overreach, seeking to return lawmakers' power to a limited, constitutional scope. Randal Howard Paul was born in Pittsburgh on January 7, 1963. He is the third of five children, born to Carol and Ron Paul. Raised in Lake Jackson, Texas, he was called "Randy." He spent summer vacations interning at his father's congressional office. His father was elected to the House of Representatives in 1976 and ran for president of the United States.

Dr. Mehmet Oz appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" from 1986 to 2011. This presence made him one of the world's best-known doctors. Oz pioneered a well-being approach using Western and alternative therapies. He thought "global medicine" offered the best way to align body, mind, and spirit. Oz co-authored self-help books: *YOU: The Owner's Manuel*, *YOU: The Smart Patient*, and *YOU: Staying Young*. All three became New York Times best-sellers.

Charles Richard Drew (June 3, 1904 – April 1, 1950) was an American surgeon and medical researcher. He researched blood transfusions, creating better blood storage techniques. Drew used this expert knowledge to build large blood banks during World War II. This work saved thousands of Allied soldiers' lives. As the most prominent African American in the field, Drew protested blood donation segregation, claiming it lacked scientific basis. He resigned from the American Red Cross, which maintained...

Dr. Manuel Enrique Araujo lived from October 12, 1865, to February 9, 1913. He served as President of El Salvador from March 1, 1911, through February 8, 1913.

Debra Janine Thomas was born March 25, 1967. She is an American former figure skater and physician. Thomas won the 1986 World championship. She earned an Olympic bronze medal in 1988. She also won the U.S. national championship twice. Her rivalry with East Germany's Katarina Witt at the 1988 Calgary Olympics was called the Battle of the Carmens.

Patrick Soon-Shiong, born July 29, 1952, is an American surgeon, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. He chairs NantWorks, LLC. Soon-Shiong serves as executive director of the Wireless Health Institute at UCLA. He also teaches surgery as an adjunct professor at UCLA. He chairs the Chan Soon-Shiong Family Foundation. Soon-Shiong leads the Chan Soon-Shiong Institute for Advanced Health. He also led National LambdaRail, which ended in 2014.

Daniel Hale Williams (January 18, 1856 – August 4, 1931) was an American general surgeon. In 1893, he performed the first documented, successful pericardium surgery in the United States to repair a wound. Williams founded Chicago's Provident Hospital, the first non-segregated hospital in the U.S., and established an associated nursing school for African Americans. The heart surgery at Provident, which his patient survived twenty years after, is called "the first successful heart surgery" by Encyclopedia Britannica. Williams was elected in 1913 as the only African-American chairman.

Joseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister (April 5, 1827 – February 10, 1912), was a British surgeon. Between 1883 and 1897, he was known as Sir Joseph Lister, Bt. Lister pioneered antiseptic surgery. He promoted sterile surgery at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. Lister introduced carbolic acid, now phenol, to sterilize surgical tools and clean wounds. Applying Louis Pasteur's microbiology, Lister championed carbolic acid as an antiseptic. This made it the first widely used antiseptic in surgery.

Sir Goldsworthy Gurney (February 14, 1793 – February 28, 1875) was an English surgeon, chemist, lecturer, consultant, architect, and builder. He was a British gentleman scientist and inventor of the Victorian era. Gurney developed the oxy-hydrogen blowpipe and applied its principles to the Bude light, a new illumination method. He developed a series of early steam-powered road vehicles and claimed the blastpipe, a key part of steam locomotive and engine success.

John Anthony Barrasso III (born July 21, 1952) is an American physician and politician. He serves as the junior United States Senator from Wyoming. Barrasso is a Republican Party member. He joined the Senate in June 2007 after Craig L. Thomas died. He won a special election in 2008 to fill the rest of Thomas's term. He won re-election for a full six-year term in 2012. In November 2018, Barrasso became the Senate Republican Conference chairman. Barrasso will become Wyoming's senior Senator in January 2021 when Mike Enzi retires from the Senate.

Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus (Greek: Κλαύδιος Γαληνός; September 129 AD – c. 200/c. 216) was a Greek physician, surgeon, and philosopher in the Roman Empire. Galen, often Anglicized as Galen and known as Galen of Pergamon, was arguably the most accomplished medical researcher of antiquity. Galen shaped the development of anatomy, physiology, pathology, pharmacology, neurology, philosophy, and logic. Galen was the son of Aelius Nicon, a wealthy architect with scholarly interests, and received a full education.

William Harkness (December 17, 1837 – February 28, 1903) was an astronomer. He was born in Ecclefechan, Scotland. His parents were James (1803–78) and Jane (née Wield) Harkness. James Harkness was a pastor. He moved the family to the United States. Harkness served in the military. He traveled widely. He led research missions. These missions developed techniques and equipment for astronomical study. Harkness died in Jersey City on February 28, 1903, at age 66.

Patrick Dacre Trevor-Roper (7 June 1916 – 22 April 2004) was a British eye surgeon, author, and gay rights activist. He was one of the first people in the United Kingdom to come out as openly gay. He played a leading role in the campaign to repeal the UK's anti-gay laws.

Gary Onik, born February 25, 1952, in Brooklyn, New York City, is a medical doctor and inventor. He uses ultrasound-guided procedures to treat cancer using cryosurgery.

Atul Gawande, born November 5, 1965, is an American surgeon, writer, and public health researcher. He practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. He is a professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Samuel O. Thier Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. In public health, he directs Ariadne Labs, a joint center for health systems innovation, and chairs Lifebox, a nonprofit that reduces surgical deaths globally. On June 20, 2018,

Dr Douglas Moray Cooper Lamb Argyll Robertson FRSE, FRCSEd LLD (1837 – January 3, 1909) was a Scottish ophthalmologist and surgeon. He introduced physostigmine into ophthalmic practice. The Argyll Robertson pupil is named after him. He served as president of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.

Joseph Bancroft (February 21, 1836 – June 16, 1894) was a surgeon, pharmacologist, and parasitologist. He was born in England and emigrated to Queensland, Australia.

George Bass (; January 30, 1771 – after February 5, 1803) was a British naval surgeon and explorer of Australia.

Charles Everett Koop (October 14, 1916 – February 25, 2013) was an American pediatric surgeon and public health administrator. He became a vice admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. He served as the 13th Surgeon General of the United States under President Ronald Reagan from 1982 to 1989. The Associated Press reported, "Koop was the only surgeon general to become a household name." Koop worked on tobacco use, AIDS, and abortion. He also supported the rights of disabled children.

Ramón Emeterio Betances y Alacán (April 8, 1827 – September 16, 1898) served as a Puerto Rican independence advocate and medical doctor. He started the Grito de Lares revolution. Betances is seen as the father of the Puerto Rican independence movement. The Grito sparked a nationalist movement among Puerto Ricans. Betances earned the title "El Padre de la Patria" (Father of the Puerto Rican Nation). He also became known as "El Padre de los Pobres" ("The Father of the Poor") for his charity. Betances was a doctor.

Sir Frederick Grant Banting (November 14, 1891 – February 21, 1941) was a Canadian medical scientist, physician, painter, and Nobel laureate. Banting co-discovered insulin and its therapeutic use. In 1923, Banting and John James Rickard Macleod won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. Banting shared the award money with Dr. Charles Best. As of November 2018, Banting, who won the Nobel Prize at age 32, remains the youngest Nobel laureate in Physiology/Medicine. The Government of Canada gave Banting a lifetime annuity in 1923 to continue his work.

Caldwell Blakeman Esselstyn Jr. (born December 12, 1933) is an American physician, author, and former Olympic rowing champion. Esselstyn wrote Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease (2007). In that book, he argued for a low-fat, whole foods, plant-based diet. This diet avoids all animal products and oils, plus soybeans, nuts, and avocados. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton supported this diet.

Michael Ellis DeBakey (born Michel Dabaghi; September 7, 1908 – July 11, 2008) was a Lebanese-American cardiac surgeon, vascular surgeon, scientist, and medical educator. DeBakey became chancellor emeritus of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. He directed The Methodist DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center and served as senior attending surgeon at The Methodist Hospital in Houston for 75 years. DeBakey was born to Lebanese Christian immigrants. He found inspiration for medicine from physicians at his father's drug store and learned sewing skills at the same time.

Harvey Williams Cushing (April 8, 1869 – October 7, 1939) was an American neurosurgeon, pathologist, writer, and draftsman. Cushing pioneered brain surgery. He became the first exclusive neurosurgeon and the first person to describe Cushing's disease. He wrote three volumes of a biography of William Osler. Cushing is known as the Father of Neurosurgery, working with Ernest Sachs.

Andrew Jeremy Wakefield, born 1957, is a discredited former British doctor. He became an anti-vaccine activist. He was a gastroenterologist. He lost his UK medical register status due to unethical behavior, misconduct, and dishonesty. This stemmed from authoring a fraudulent research paper. That paper claimed a link between the MMR vaccine and autism and bowel disease. Other researchers could not reproduce Wakefield's findings or confirm his hypothesis linking the MMR vaccine to autism or autism and gastrointestinal disease.

Francis Daniels Moore (April 17, 1913, Evanston, Illinois – November 24, 2001, Westwood, Massachusetts) was an American surgeon. He pioneered many experimental surgical treatments. Moore refined burn-treatment techniques. He helped perform the world's first successful organ transplant, which involved a kidney. He accurately measured the volume of water and other nutrients in the human body using radioactive isotopes. The 1978 Lister Medal went to him for his surgical science contributions. The corresponding Lister Oration began...

Commander Andrew James Baldwin, MD, USN, was born February 5, 1977, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA. He is a US Naval Officer, an ironman triathlete, a humanitarian, and a physician. Baldwin grew up in Pennsylvania. He earned his bachelor's from Duke University and his medical degree from UCSF. He appears on the 10th season of the reality dating show The Bachelor, dubbed The Bachelor: Officer and a Gentleman. On November 13, 2007, he told Honolulu, Hawaii's ABC TV affiliate KITV, he would soon deploy to Bahrain. Micronesia's leading newspaper, Marianas Variety, recorded...

Elliot Carr Cutler CB, OBE, lived from July 30, 1888, to August 16, 1947. He was an American surgeon, military physician, and medical educator. Cutler served as Moseley Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. He was Surgeon-in-Chief at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital from 1932 to 1947. He also served as a Brigadier General in the U.S. Army Medical Corps.

Mary Edwards Walker, M.D. (November 26, 1832 – February 21, 1919), known as Dr. Mary Walker, was an American abolitionist, prohibitionist, prisoner of war, and surgeon. She received the Medal of Honor; she is the only woman to do so. In 1855, she got her medical degree from Syracuse Medical College in New York. She married and opened a medical practice. She volunteered with the Union Army at the start of the Civil War. She served as a surgeon at a temporary hospital in Washington, D.C. Women and sectarian physicians were considered unfit for the Union Army at that time.

Anthony Federico DePalma, born October 12, 1904, and died April 6, 2005, was an orthopedic surgeon. He was a humanitarian and a teacher at Thomas Jefferson University. DePalma founded the orthopedic department at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

Devi Prasad Shetty, born May 8, 1953, is an Indian cardiac surgeon and entrepreneur. He founded Narayana Health, a chain of 21 medical centers across India. He performed over 15,000 heart operations. In 2004, he received the Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award. He received the Padma Bhushan in 2012, the third highest civilian award from the Government of India for affordable healthcare work.

Dr. George Darby Haviland (1857–1901) was a British surgeon and naturalist. He was born in Warbleton, Sussex, England. Haviland directed the Raffles Museum in Singapore. He also served as a medical officer in Sarawak and Curator of the Sarawak Museum in Kuching from 1891 to 1893. In 1895, he returned to England. He worked at the Kew Herbarium in London before dying in Natal, South Africa.

Dorothy Lavinia Brown (January 7, 1914 – June 13, 2004), also "Dr. D.", was an African-American surgeon, legislator, and teacher. She became the first female surgeon of African-American ancestry from the Southeastern United States. Brown also became the first African American woman to serve in the Tennessee General Assembly, winning election to the Tennessee House of Representatives. While in the House, Brown fought for women's rights regarding abortions and for the rights of people of color.

Tobias George Smollett (baptized March 19, 1721; died September 17, 1771) was a Scottish poet and author. Smollett wrote picaresque novels, such as The Adventures of Roderick Random (1748) and The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751), and The Expedition of Humphry Clinker (1771). His novels influenced later novelists like Charles Dickens. Printers altered his novels. Dr. O. M. Brack Jr. edited definitive editions of his works to correct variations.

Baron Dominique Jean Larrey (French: [larɛ]; July 8, 1766 – July 25, 1842) was a French surgeon in Napoleon's Grande Armée. Larrey innovated battlefield medicine and triage. He is often considered the first modern military surgeon.

Joseph Benjamin Stenbuck (December 22, 1891 – June 1, 1951) was a major Manhattan surgeon at Sydenham and Harlem Hospital.

Dr. Samuel Lee Kountz Jr. (October 30, 1930 – December 23, 1981) was an African-American kidney transplantation surgeon from Lexa, Arkansas. Kountz earned distinction for pioneering work in kidney transplantations and research, discoveries, and inventions in Renal Science. In 1961, while at the Stanford University Medical Center, he performed the first successful kidney transplant between humans who were not identical twins. Six years later, he and a team at the University of California, San Francisco, developed the prototype for the Belzer kidney pe

Wilder Graves Penfield (January 26, 1891 – April 5, 1976) was an American-Canadian neurosurgeon. He expanded brain surgery methods and techniques, mapping brain region functions like the cortical homunculus. Penfield studied neural stimulation across topics like hallucinations, illusions, and déjà vu. Penfield focused his thinking on mental processes, considering if the human soul had a scientific basis.

Baron Guillaume Dupuytren (French: [ɡijom dypɥitʁɛ̃]; 5 October 1777 – 8 February 1835) was a French anatomist and military surgeon. He gained respect treating Napoleon Bonaparte's hemorrhoids. Dupuytren's contracture, named after him, was described in 1831 and published in The Lancet in 1834.

Eric Sidney Watkins (September 6, 1928 – September 12, 2012), known in Formula One as Professor Sid or Prof, was an English neurosurgeon. Watkins was born in Liverpool. He studied at the University of Liverpool and graduated in 1952. He served four years in the Royal Army Medical Corps. Watkins then specialized in neurosurgery in Oxford and London. Watkins also worked as a race track doctor on weekends. He continued this work at Watkins Glen International. He became a Professor of Neurosurgery at Syracuse University. At a meeting with Brabham team boss Be

Lewis Archer Boswell (May 9, 1834 – November 26, 1909) was an early aviation pioneer. Some believe he made the first powered, heavier-than-air flight before the Wright Brothers.

Raymond O. Heimbecker (November 29, 1922 – February 13, 2014) was a Canadian cardiovascular surgeon. Heimbecker performed the world’s first complete heart valve transplant in 1962. He performed Canada’s first modern heart transplant in 1981 using anti-rejection drugs to extend patient survival. Heimbecker was born in Calgary, Alberta. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Saskatchewan in 1944. He got his Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Toronto in 1947. He also earned a Master of Arts in physiology and a Master of Science in surgery. He worked with Wilfred Bigelow and Alfre

Herbert Alexander Bruce FRCS (September 28, 1868 – June 23, 1963) served as the 15th Lieutenant Governor of Ontario, Canada, from 1932 to 1937. Bruce was born in Blackstock, Ontario, near Port Perry. Bruce studied surgery at the University of Toronto and in Paris and Vienna. He was a member of the Royal College of Surgeons. Bruce owned Wellesley Hospital in Toronto, which he founded in 1911. He taught surgery at the University of Toronto. In 1916, during World War I, Sir Sam Hughes appointed him inspector-general of the Canadian Army Medical Corps, and Bruce reached the rank of colonel

Daniel Stevenson Foster, born January 31, 1948, served as a Democratic member of the West Virginia Senate, representing the 17th District from 2004 through 2012. He previously served in the West Virginia House of Delegates from 2002 through 2004.

Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden, born September 7, 1829, died December 22, 1887, was an American geologist. He pioneered surveying expeditions in the Rocky Mountains during the late 19th century. Hayden also served with the Union Army during the Civil War.

Robert Maurice Lipson Winston, Baron Winston, born July 15, 1940, is a British professor, medical doctor, scientist, television presenter, and Labour Party politician.

Robert Holbrook Smith, also known as Dr. Bob, born August 8, 1879, died November 16, 1950, was an American physician and surgeon. He co-founded Alcoholics Anonymous with Bill Wilson, Bill W.

Akrit Pran Jaswal is Indian. He performed his first surgery at age seven. Akrit aims to continue his studies at Harvard University. His estimated IQ is 146. Akrit traveled to Britain around age 12 to discuss the cancer cure.