ABSTRACT
Hospitals expanded to include individual clinics for urological, neurological, thoracic, orthopaedic, paediatric, plastic and transplantation surgery, besides anaesthesiology and gynaecology. Using the low-pressure chamber, Ernst Ferdinand Sauerbruch started to gain experience in thoracic surgery. An embolus may originate from part of the heart that is narrowed or from irregular heartbeat. Perhaps the greatest advances in diagnosis of acquired heart defects were made by James Hope. A surgeon can calmly operate inside the heart, or rebuild large vessels to and from the lungs, only if the heart is disconnected. The patient’s blood circulation must then be maintained with a machine to keep supplying oxygen to the rest of the body. Graham Harvey’s demonstration of the circulation of the blood was the single most important biological discovery to influence surgery. Experienced neurologists and neurosurgeons have described the steps that must be taken to show that the brain stem, which connects the brain to the rest of the body, has been destroyed irreversibly.
