Paediatric heart transplant surgery. Dr Leonard Bailey,a surgeon at the Loma Linda Medical Centre,California,pauses during the intricate operation to check the infant's vital signs on a monitor. Bailey worked without the aid of an operating microscope or magnifying loupes,using sutures 30 microns in width,1/3 the diameter of a human hair,to connect blood vessels to the transplanted heart. The patient,a boy in his second month,was suffering from a potentially fatal congenital heart defect. Throughout the operation,the function of the heart & lungs was taken over by a machine,via the connecting pipes visible at bottom |