This experience is the reason many patients with high-risk conditions due to the advanced stage of their cardiovascular or heart disease are referred to our surgeons. Often these patients require the level of surgical skill and experience not available elsewhere. It is not uncommon for our surgeons to successfully treat patients with conditions that have been deemed hopeless by others.

Following are brief biographical notes of our surgeons. Detailed biographies are available. Please feel free to contact our surgeons if you have any questions regarding a medical problem. They may be reached by telephone, fax, post mail, or e-mail.

Denton A. Cooley, M.D., surgeon-in-chief and president of the Texas Heart Institute, replaces the entire thoracic aorta in a procedure he recently devised. Dr. Cooley, a world-renowned cardiovascular surgeon, has been associated with numerous "firsts," including the first successful human heart transplant in the United States (1968) and the first implantation of a total artificial heart (1969). In 1962, he founded the Texas Heart Institute. By 1997, surgeons at the Institute had performed nearly 100,000 open heart surgical procedures.

J. Michael Duncan, M.D., performs a heart transplant operation. Before the operation, this patient's failing heart had been supported by a HeartMate left ventricular assist device. The device pumped blood for the patient's diseased heart and kept him alive until a suitable donor heart became available for transplantation. Dr. Duncan also directs the Cardiovascular Fellowship Program at the Institute

Professor, University of Texas Medical School, Houston; Clinical Associate Professor, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston

O.H. Frazier, M.D., sutures a donor heart in place. Dr. Frazier is chief of Transplant Services at the Texas Heart Institute and St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital and co-director of the Institute's Cullen Cardiovascular Research Laboratories. He is known nationally and internationally for his work in the fields of left ventricular assistance and heart transplantation.

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Dr. Igor Gregoric has focused on the surgical treatment of severe heart failure, specifically in the fields of heart transplantation and mechanical assist devices that may be used either to substitute for or to assist the action of the human heart. His clinical experience includes involvement in approximately 400 cardiac and 300 vascular operations annually. Additionally, Dr. Gregoric has assisted or personally performed over 200 heart transplants during his career.

Charles H. Hallman, M.D., implants an arterial-venous graft-- a vascular procedure-- to provide access to the bloodstream in a patient who requires hemodialysis to clear his body of harmful waste products. The term "vascular" refers to the blood vessels of the body, excluding those of the heart. By 1997, more than 35,000 vascular procedures had been performed at the Texas Heart Institute.

James J. Livesay, M.D. repairs an aneurysm of the abdominal aorta. An aneurysm is a bulging in an area of weakened tissue, in this case the wall of the aorta, the largest blood vessel in the body. The abdominal section is the most common site for aneurysmal formation in the aorta. Often these aneurysms result from atherosclerosis, the same process that causes blockages in the coronary arteries.

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Personal website

David A. Ott, M.D., prepares to replace a diseased heart valve during an open heart surgical operation. The valves (four in all) regulate blood flow through the heart. Dr. Ott, director of the Institute's Cardiothoracic Surgery Residency Program, is being observed by a resident who is completing his surgical training at the Texas Heart Institute.

George J. Reul, M.D., repairs an aneurysm that has formed in the wall of the heart. This type of aneurysm may develop after a heart attack in an area of the heart muscle that has been damaged from lack of oxygen during the heart attack. Dr. Reul is associate chief of surgery at the Texas Heart Institute and director of the Peripheral Vascular Laboratory at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital.

Ross M. Reul, M.D.