Posts tagged: Organ Transplantation

Joseph Murray Papers Open to Research

By , March 18, 2013

Joseph E. Murray

The Center for the History of Medicine is pleased to announce the opening of the Joseph E. Murray papers, 1919-2011. The papers are the product of Murray’s activities as a plastic surgeon, transplant surgeon, laboratory director, author, and Harvard Medical School alumnus, and include records from Murray’s plastic surgery and transplantation work at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and Children’s Hospital Boston. The collection also contains his personal and professional correspondence, records from his activities as chairman of the Harvard Medical Alumni Fund, records from reunions of the Harvard Medical School class of 1943b, as well as Murray’s professional writings.

Joseph E. Murray (1919-2012), A.B., 1940, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts; M.D., 1943, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, transplant and plastic surgeon, received the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on organ transplantation. Murray served as Head of the plastic surgery departments at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital and Children’s Hospital Boston, Chief of Transplant Surgery at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, and Director of the Surgical Research Laboratory at Harvard Medical School. In 1954, Murray performed the first successful human organ transplantation, between identical twins, Ronald (donor) and Richard (recipient) Herrick, at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital.

The finding aid for the collection can be found here.

For information regarding access to this collection, please contact the Public Services staff.

Links to previous blog posts on Joseph Murray:
In Memoriam: Joseph E. Murray, 1919-2012
Staff Finds: Joseph Murray and the Surgical Research Laboratory
Joseph Murray on the First Successful Human Organ Transplant

Joseph Murray on the First Successful Human Organ Transplant

By , September 30, 2011

Dr. Joseph Murray

The current issue of Harvard Medicine features an essay by Dr. Joseph Murray reflecting on the first successful organ transplantation. Murray discusses how his service as an army surgeon during World War II helped influence the direction of his career, as well as describing the procedure and its aftermath. The transplant involved numerous surgical risks, but also raised additional issues:

This list of potential risks posed an ethical dilemma for us. While we routinely asked patients to incur some risk in order to achieve a benefit for themselves, none of us had ever asked a healthy person to accept this magnitude of risk solely for the sake of someone else. We consulted with experienced physicians within and outside of the Brigham, clergy of all denominations, and legal counsel before offering the option of transplantation. The team met several times with the family to describe in detail what was involved for Ronald and Richard. We advised neither for nor against the operation, and we stated the obvious: We could not know if it would work.

Joseph Murray (B.A., 1940, Holy Cross College, M.D., 1943, Harvard) was Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and Chief of Plastic Surgery at Brigham Hospital and Children’s Hospital. He received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1990, for his work on organ transplantation. The Center holds the Joseph E. Murray Papers, 1919-1999. For information regarding access, please contact the Public Services staff.

Joseph Murray (third from left), performing the first successful organ transplant at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Boston, MA, December 23, 1954.

UPDATE: The Harvard Gazette interviewed Dr. Murray about the 1954 transplant as part of a series celebrating Harvard’s 375th anniversary.

Panorama Theme by Themocracy