Portrait of Dr. Richard L. Varco, Professor of Surgery, University of Minnesota Medical School

Portrait of Dr. Richard L. Varco, Professor of Surgery, University of Minnesota Medical School

Open Heart Surgery

Dr. Richard Lynn Varco (1912-2004), a University of Minnesota graduate (M.B. 1937, M.D. 1937, Ph.D. 1944), was a Medical Fellow and Research Assistant in the Department of Surgery (1938-1940), Fellow and Instructor in the Department of Physiology (1940-1942), and Senior Resident (1942-1943), Instructor (1943-1944), Assistant Professor (1944-1946), Associate Professor (1946-1950), and Professor (1950-1981) in the Department of Surgery. He was named a Regents' Professor in 1974.

Dr. Varco is known for his contributions to intracardiac surgery as a member of the team that performed the world's first open heart surgery in a dry field under direct vision on September 2, 1952. Varco also performed the University's first kidney transplant in 1963. In 1969 he co-invented an implanted fusion pump used for chemotherapy and insulin delivery.

University of Minnesota

"Vant-Vez," Photograph Collection. University of Minnesota Archives.

University of Minnesota

1955

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Open Heart Surgery

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