HEART SURGERY

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28415, 23 October 1957, Page 16

HEART SURGERY

Development Of New Techniques

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, October 22.

Operations for coronary-arter-ial diseases—the “real killers" — are now being developed and are likely to be the “most fruitful” new operations in the near future, one of the world's leading heart surgeons. Sir Russell Brock, said in Auckland today. Operations evolved in the last 10 years were already saving many lives and preventing permanent disability in others, he said.

Sir Russell Brock arrived from Sydney last night for a two-week visit, and will give lectures in Auckland and Dunedin. This week he will operate on two patients at Green Lane Hospital, Auckland where he will demonstrate techniques he uses at Guy’s Hospital, London.

Sir Russell Brock was one of the pioneers of valvactomy, an operation to widen the valve between two chambers of the heart when it has become too narrow because of diseases such as acute rheumatism. “This condition, mitral stenosis, was responsible for a great number of deaths and a lot of disability.” he said. “We did the first operation in 1948, and it has become a standard operation in the last six or seven years.”

This and similar operations had substantially reduced the number of deaths and enabled many patients to live a normal life and provide for their families. Sir Russell Brock said he made extensive use of hypothermia, in which the patient’s body is cooled, and the blood supply to the heart can be interrupted without harm for up to 10 minutes. “It enables us to do a large number of operations with the heart wide open.” he said. This was much simpler than making use of artificial heart-lung byDass during the operation. He said he had done about 12 operations with the heart-lung machine (which oxygenates the blood while the heart is being repaired). but the present machines would have to be improved considerably before wider use could be made of them. “They are linked up with our future developments, but they must become much simpler,” he said.