The life and work of Judson T. Chesterman, pioneering cardiac surgeon

Judson Chesterman (1903-1987) was a surgeon working in Sheffield, United Kingdom in the mid-20th century. Born in Bath, Somerset, he attended Bristol Medical School before completing junior doctor positions around England. He developed his skills in thoracic surgery during a Fellowship with Evarts Graham (1883-1957) at Barnes Hospital, St Louis, Missouri and by the mid-1950s was also performing a large number of closed cardiac procedures. In 1955, he performed the first mitral valve replacement in the world, using a prosthesis of his own design, but the patient only survived for around 18 hours. Recognising the limitations of off-pump surgery, he visited the University of Minneapolis before building his own bypass machine and used it in two patients, the first in February 1957, one of the earliest outside the United States of America to do so. In retirement he established an osteoarchaeology laboratory and made additional contributions to that field.