Christiaan Barnard

Christiaan Barnard (1922-2001), South African surgeon who performed the first human heart-transplant operation.

Christiaan Neethling Barnard was born in Beaufort West, and received an M.D. degree from the University of Cape Town in 1953 and a Ph.D. degree from the University of Minnesota in 1958. He returned to the University of Cape Town in 1958 to teach surgery. Barnard specialized in open-heart surgery and in designing artificial heart valves.

On December 3, 1967, he performed the first human heart transplant, transferring the heart of a 25-year-old woman into the body of Louis Washkansky, a 55-year-old grocer; Washkansky died 18 days later. The second transplant, on January 2, 1968, was for Philip Blaiberg, who lived for 563 days after the operation. However, heart transplant surgery later became standard after the development of powerful drugs that prevented the body’s immune system from rejecting the transplant.

Barnard continued to practice surgery until 1983, when arthritis in his fingers led to his retirement. Barnard's autobiography, One Life, was published in 1969.