Women in thoracic surgery and the Thoracic Surgery Foundation for Research and Education

Abstract

Women in thoracic surgery have been important in the founding and subsequent development of The Thoracic Surgery Foundation for Research and Education. In 1984, Dr Martin McKneally first proposed the creation of a foundation to support research and education in thoracic surgery. In 1989, the Society of Thoracic Surgeon Education and Research Foundation was established. Because of limited financial support, its programs were minimal. In 1992, Dr Eugene Braunwald, desiring to establish a memorial to his wife, Dr Nina Starr Braunwald, was directed to the Foundation. Dr Braunwald, family, friends, and colleagues of the late Nina Starr Braunwald provided the Foundation with a major gift to establish the Nina Starr Braunwald Memorial Fund. This provided the impetus for support from the four major thoracic surgery organizations: The American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS), The Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS), The Southern Thoracic Surgery Association (STSA), and The Western Thoracic Surgery Association (WTSA), and The Society of Thoracic Surgeons for Education and Research was reorganized as The Thoracic Surgery Foundation for Research and Education to serve all of thoracic surgery. Nina Starr Braunwald was not only an outstanding pioneer woman thoracic surgeon, but an outstanding surgeon among all surgeons. Dr Braunwald was born in New York in 1928. She had her undergraduate and medical education at New York University and embarked on her surgical training at Bellevue Hospital. She completed her general surgery training at Georgetown University Medical Center where she also obtained a Master of Science Degree in Surgery, working as a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr Charles Hufnagel. Her cardiothoracic surgery training was accomplished at the National Heart Institute under Dr Andrew Morrow. In 1961, she became the first woman to be certified by the American Board of Thoracic Surgery. Doctor Braunwald’s career included appointments as Deputy Chief, The Clinic of Surgery at the National Heart Institute, Associate Professor of Surgery at the University of California at San Diego, where she established that institution’s first cardiac surgical program. In 1972, she accepted an appointment as Associate Professor in Surgery at Harvard with staff appointments at the Brigham and Women’s, Boston Children’s, and the West Roxbury Veteran’s Administration Hospital. Throughout Dr Braunwald’s career, she was recognized as a true academic surgeon with achievements and contributions in research, clinical surgery, and education. Many of the current leaders of thoracic surgery owe much of their career success to their association with Nina Braunwald. Doctor Braunwald’s bibliography of over 150 publications delineates her interests and contributions to cardiac surgery. These include measurement of extracellular fluid compartments, basic studies in tissue transplantation, and, most importantly, her pioneering work in the design and fabrication of mechanical heart valves. This work led to her performing the first successful mitral valve replacement with a prosthetic valve. Doctor Braunwald was recognized and honored by many organizations. She received the Distinguished Member Award of The Association of Women’s Surgeons and was the first woman elected to membership in The American Association for Thoracic Surgery. The Nina Starr Braunwald Memorial Fund provides research fellowships and career development awards for women in thoracic surgery. This fund of The Thoracic Surgery Foundation has grown to over $2,000,000 and is now sufficient to ensure these awards in perpetuity, a most appropriate memorial to an outstanding thoracic surgeon. Since 1993, the Foundation has made research awards to eight women: four Nina Braunwald Research Fellowships, three Nina Braunwald Career Development Awards, and one Thoracic Surgery Foundation Fellowship.