Voting Station

Michael E. DeBakey

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Doctor

The Resume

    (September 7, 1908-July 11, 2008)
    Born in Lake Charles, Louisiana
    Birth name was Michel Debaghi
    Pioneer of open-heart surgery, bypass surgery and angioplasty
    Invented the pump for the heart-lung machine
    Received the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1969), National Medal of Science (1987) and Congressional Gold Medal (2008)

Why he might be annoying:

    He had a decades-long feud with fellow heart surgery pioneer Denton Cooley.
    He was know for directing withering remarks ('I am surrounded by incompetents') to surgical residents.
    He fired aides over trivial mistakes.
    He was a name-dropper who chatted about the ailments of his famous patients.
    He wore white cowboy boots into surgery.
    Although he pioneered the surgical treatment for aortic dissection, when he suffered the condition himself (2005), he resisted undergoing surgery.

Why he might not be annoying:

    He said of his reputation, 'If you were on the operating table, would you want a perfectionist, or someone who cared little for details?'
    He published one of the first studies linking smoking and lung cancer (1939).
    Working for the Surgeon General during World War II, he helped develop the concept of Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) units.
    He supervised a quintuple-byass on Boris Yeltsin (1996), who called him 'a magician of the heart.'
    He performed surgery into his 90s.
    He performed an estimated 60,000 operations over his lifetime.
    The Journal of the American Medical Association noted, 'Many consider Michael E. DeBakey to be the greatest surgeon ever.' (2005)

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 5 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 14 Votes: 14.29% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 14 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 88 Votes: 52.27% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 5 Votes: 40.0% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 2 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 7 Votes: 42.86% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 11 Votes: 36.36% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 17 Votes: 47.06% Annoying
    In 2014, Out of 26 Votes: 53.85% Annoying
    In 2013, Out of 21 Votes: 47.62% Annoying
    In 2012, Out of 52 Votes: 32.69% Annoying
    In 2011, Out of 74 Votes: 47.30% Annoying
    In 2010, Out of 78 Votes: 44.87% Annoying
    In 2009, Out of 66 Votes: 37.88% Annoying
    In 2008, Out of 371 Votes: 32.08% Annoying