Proving heart surgery is possible

The first "blue-baby operation" was a major step in heart surgery. In 1944 at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, surgeon Alfred Blalock, pediatric cardiologist Helen Taussig, and surgical technician Vivien Thomas perfected a technique for correcting the birth defect that causes the blue-baby syndrome.

Although the operation was on blood vessels external to the heart and did not require a heart-lung machine, its success proved that intervention near the living heart was possible. During the next decade, surgeons developed and refined many techniques for correcting heart defects.

Making blue babies pink

"Blue babies" have bluish skin color because their blood doesn't get enough oxygen. Taussig conceived a method for getting more oxygen to the blood and went to Blalock to develop a surgical technique. They connected an artery leaving the heart to the pulmonary artery, sending some blood back to the lungs for a second chance to pick up oxygen.

"One can only imagine the excitement we felt when the clamps were released from the vessels, and the infant's lips changed from deep blue of cyanosis to a glorious pink," said Dr. Denton A. Cooley, a world-reknowned heart surgeon who, as a young resident, assisted as Dr. Blalock performed the first blue baby operation.