The surgeon who saved thousands of lives thanks to a brain injury that changed his personality

Stephen Westaby has operated on over 12,000 hearts and estimates he has saved 97% of his patients. That, in itself, is impressive.

But the doctor, now 73, is also an innovative pioneer, internationally recognized for helping to develop and refine the use of heart pumps, artificial hearts and circulatory support technology to get blood throughout the body.

He has always had a flair for medicine and said he decided to become a heart surgeon at the age of seven, after seeing a heart-lung machine in action in a BBC medical series called “Your Life in Their Hands” (Your Life in Their Hands, in English).

Despite this, Westaby says his professional career would have been very different had it not been for a blow to the head he received when he was 18. How did it all start?

The grandfather

The illness and agonizing death of his beloved grandfather cemented Westaby’s decision to become a heart surgeon.

“One day we were walking the dog and he put his hand on his chest and fell to his knees. After about half an hour he got up and we went home,” he told the BBC’s Outlook programme.

“We didn’t know what he had was a heart attack. Then I watched him have another and another, and then sink into severe heart failure, leading to a miserable existence. Finally, one day I came home from school and saw the doctor outside my grandfather’s house. I entered silently and watched my grandfather die blue without being able to breathe.”

It was this same grandfather who realized that his grandson had a highly prized skill for a surgeon. “He noticed that I was ambidextrous. He taught me to paint and saw that I could draw with both hands.”

Though predominantly right-handed, Westaby could manipulate a pen, brush (and eventually surgical instruments) with both hands.

With that dexterity and an extraordinarily precise spatial awareness that allowed him to draw well, he already had two points in his favor for becoming what he wanted.

But there was one relevant factor that weighed against him.

excessive shyness

“Surgeons need to have the right temperament,” explained Westaby in an article in the British Daily Mail.

“You have to be able to explain death to grieving family members. You have to have the courage to stand in for your boss when he gets tired, the courage to take responsibility for the post-operative care of small babies or face catastrophes in the living room.” of emergency.”

“I was a shy, modest, unassuming boy who was afraid of his own shadow.”

So much so that when he was offered the opportunity to study at Cambridge, one of the best universities in the world, he declined, thinking he would feel out of place.

Instead, he opted for Charing Cross Medical School in London, thinking he could have a more discreet student life there. And so it was. At first, his university life was uneventful.

During this period, however, he decided to learn to play rugby, which would change his life forever.

The blow to the head

In 1968, “we went on tour playing rugby. On a gray winter day we faced a team from Cornish, which had very tough players. I was hit in the head, fracturing the frontal bone of my skull.”

“I was seeing stars in the dressing room and instead of taking me to a hospital, those medical students took me to the pub. After several pints of beer and passing out, I woke up the next day very sick.”

Finally, they sent him to the hospital. Not only would Westaby miss the rugby tour, it could have been the end of his medical career. But the incident, oddly enough, had exactly the opposite effect.

“The first night at the hospital, I, that shy, introverted boy, flirted with the nurse who was taking care of me.”

When they tried to answer him, he responded aggressively, as he never would have done before. Something had changed.

Without fear

X-rays revealed a small crack in the frontal bone of the skull.

“The head trauma affected the part of my brain responsible for critical thinking and risk avoidance. This explained my new lack of inhibition, irritability and occasional aggression.”

“Psychologists’ tests showed that I scored high on something called a ‘psychopathic personality inventory,’ and the psychologist said to me, ‘Don’t worry, most high achievers are psychopaths. Surgeons in particular.’ It was expected to go back to normal once the swelling subsided, but luckily for me it didn’t.”

The result of the head injury was to reduce Westaby’s fear and inhibitions.

“Suddenly I became the social secretary of the medical faculty, which organized university parties, and soon after, the captain of rugby and cricket.”

“I seemed immune to stress and became a habitual risk taker, an adrenaline junkie who constantly craved excitement. In short, I came out of the head injury experience uninhibited and relentlessly competitive.”

Westaby now had “the complete combination of skills for a successful surgeon”: coordination, manual dexterity, and daring.

“The last thing you want is a scared surgeon.”

mechanical heart

Westaby lived the next four decades in that tense zone between life and death, punctuated by the sounds of heartbeats.

Among other things, he specialized in the complicated field of pediatric surgery and operation on babies and developed a method of heart surgery without intensive care.

But one area in particular fascinated him: the potential of artificial hearts. “You can help people with heart failure, but heart transplants are very rare. You need someone to die to give you that organ.”

“I always thought there must be a better way, a mechanical solution.” But the artificial hearts were too big, bulky and impractical.

“One day in 1993, I met an engineer who worked on artificial hearts named Robert Jarvik.” It was the beginning of a partnership that would revolutionize heart surgery.

Jarvik had invented a pump that helped circulate blood through the body, but he didn’t know how to keep it running. It was there that Dr. Westaby entered. Together they created the Jarvik 2000, a miniature battery-powered turbine.

“The first person to own a Jarvik 2000 was a 59-year-old man named Peter Houghton.”

Westaby was told by the Oxford Research Laboratory that he could only insert the device into a patient whose life expectancy was only a few weeks.

“When he was brought to my office in a wheelchair, his ankles were swollen, his lips were blue, his belly was swollen. He reminded me of my grandfather just before he died and I was desperate to help him.”

Peter would live another 8 years, much longer than anyone with an artificial heart at the time.

Meanwhile, Westaby was gaining fame, and not just in medical circles. In 2004, she received a phone call that brought back echoes of the past. “There were some television producers who wanted to do a show called ‘Your Life in Their Hands’ with me.”

“I immediately said I would be happy to talk to them because this was the show I watched when I was 7 years old.” Decades after seeing the show that would inspire him to be a doctor, Westaby became the protagonist of one of the episodes of the series.