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Heart disease is the top killer in the U.S. today, and strokes rank third, just behind cancer. But heart disease and strokes both develop from diseases of the arteries, and together they account for 75% of all U.S. deaths. The deadly statistics, contends Houston Surgeon Michael E. DeBakey, make cardiovascular (heart-artery) disease the most pressing problem of modern medicine.
Dr. DeBakey speaks with singular authority. Since 1948, the dexterous scalpel and deft needle of Baylor University's professor of surgery have operated on more than 10,000 human hearts and arteries. From the far corners of the earth the great and the humble have traveled to Texas to have Surgeon DeBakey patch up their arteries with Dacron or implant artificial valves of plastic and sophisticated alloys in their hearts.
To Dr. DeBakey went H.R.H. the Duke of Windsor to have a potentially fatal, grapefruit-sized aneurysm removed from his abdominal aorta (TIME, Dec. 25). And it was to Dr. DeBakey and Houston's Methodist Hospital that the TV producers of the U.S. and Europe turned a month ago when they wanted to let 300 million televiewers, aided by Comsat's Early Bird, watch an exquisitely delicate heart operation, with the surgeon literally holding a life in his hand. To Dr. DeBakey both Presidents Kennedy and Johnson turned when they needed a man to head committees and commissions to recommend means by which Americans can get the best of medical and surgical care when they fall victim to heart disease, strokes or cancer.
While admiring colleagues boggle at the versatility and variety of his accomplishments—the arterial-replacement surgery, the delicate work inside the heart, the bold approach to strokes—DeBakey races on toward more imaginative goals. Now from his busy laboratories comes the confident prediction that surgical skills may soon be equal to the ultimate achievement—the implantation in a human of an artificial heart.
Diet & Stress. His vast experience has left Surgeon DeBakey firm in the conviction that the various artery diseases have as many distinct causes as there are different kinds of fevers. He is sure that it will take long and painstaking research to pinpoint all those causes and find cures or preventives. He is sure that causes and cures will eventually be found, but he is frankly disappointed with the results so far.
Diet and cholesterol are still largely unknown quantities. "We have examined thousands of arteries that had been blocked by arteriosclerosis, and we have compared the cholesterol levels of these patients with those of normal, healthy people," he says. "We can find no consistent, significant relation between the cholesterol levels and the extent and severity of the disease." The effects of stress the pragmatic surgeon dismisses with characteristic scorn: "Man was made to work, and work hard. I don't think it ever hurt anyone."
DeBakey is deeply involved in the forward-looking research that may some day do away with the need for his surgical skills. "We can't stand by and wait for final answers," he says. "There are lives to be saved today, and future illnesses to be prevented."