Adult Cardiac Surgery Services

In 1968, Dr. Norman Shumway performed the first adult heart transplant in the United States, and established Stanford as a global leader in cardiac surgery. In 1981, Dr. Bruce Reitz completed the first combined heart and lung transplant in the world. A few years later, Dr. Philip Oyer was part of a team that first successfully used a mechanical device as a "bridge" to transplant, supporting a patient in end-stage heart failure until a heart transplant was possible. In the mid to late 1990s, Stanford cardiac surgeons were among the first to perform minimally invasive coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgeries.

Drs. Craig Miller, and R. Scott Mitchell designed and implanted stent grafts to repair thoracic aortic aneurysms and dissections (TEVAR). In the late 1990's pediatric cardiac surgeon Dr. Frank L. Hanley developed the technique of single-stage unifocalization to correct deficient pulmonary vasculature in a congenital heart defect with a single surgery rather than multiple procedures.

Today's cardiac surgeons at Stanford continue to extend this tradition of excellence with pioneering innovations in complex valve repair, minimally invasive and robotic operations, beating-heart surgery, hybrid aortic reconstruction, arrhythmia operations, triple-organ transplantation, novel artificial heart and lung devices, and stem cell therapy to repair and regenerate the heart.