Albert Starr
Encyclopedia
Albert Starr is a noted cardiovascular surgeon and pioneer, inventor of the Starr heart valve
Heart valve
A heart valve normally allows blood flow in only one direction through the heart. The four valves commonly represented in a mammalian heart determine the pathway of blood flow through the heart...

, who resides and practices in the Portland
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

 area. Starr is Medical Director of the Providence Heart and Vascular Institute. (source: Oregonian, 8/23/2007)

Albert Starr was born on June 1, 1926, in New York, New York. He received his B.A.
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...

 degree from Columbia College
Columbia College of Columbia University
Columbia College is the oldest undergraduate college at Columbia University, situated on the university's main campus in Morningside Heights in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1754 by the Church of England as King's College, receiving a Royal Charter from King George II...

 (now Columbia University) in 1946 and his M.D.
Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...

 degree from Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons
Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons
Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, often known as P&S, is a graduate school of Columbia University that is located on the health sciences campus in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan...

 in 1949. He then went on to do his internship at Johns Hopkins Hospital
Johns Hopkins Hospital
The Johns Hopkins Hospital is the teaching hospital and biomedical research facility of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, located in Baltimore, Maryland . It was founded using money from a bequest by philanthropist Johns Hopkins...

 and his residency
Residency (medicine)
Residency is a stage of graduate medical training. A resident physician or resident is a person who has received a medical degree , Podiatric degree , Dental Degree and who practices...

 in general
General surgery
General surgery, despite its name, is a surgical specialty that focuses on abdominal organs, e.g., intestines including esophagus, stomach, small bowel, colon, liver, pancreas, gallbladder and bile ducts, and often the thyroid gland . They also deal with diseases involving the skin, breast, soft...

 and thoracic surgery
Thoracic surgery
Thoracic surgery is the field of medicine involved in the surgical treatment of diseases affecting organs inside the thorax . Generally treatment of conditions of the lungs, chest wall, and diaphragm....

 at the Bellevue
Bellevue Hospital Center
Bellevue Hospital Center, most often referred to as "Bellevue", was founded on March 31, 1736 and is the oldest public hospital in the United States. Located on First Avenue in the Kips Bay neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, Bellevue is famous from many literary, film and television...

 and Presbyterian Hospitals
NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital
NewYork–Presbyterian Hospital is a prominent university hospital in New York City affiliated with two Ivy League medical schools: Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons and Cornell University's Weill Medical College. It is composed of two distinct medical centers, Columbia...

 of Columbia University. He was an assistant in surgeon at Columbia University until 1957, when he moved to Oregon—having been enticed, in part, by the Oregon Heart Association's promises to help fund his research and to take him salmon
Salmon
Salmon is the common name for several species of fish in the family Salmonidae. Several other fish in the same family are called trout; the difference is often said to be that salmon migrate and trout are resident, but this distinction does not strictly hold true...

 fishing. There he worked for the Crippled Children's Division at the University of Oregon Medical School (now the Oregon Health and Science University). Starr was an instructor in surgery when he met Lowell Edwards in September 1958. Starr has said of this meeting, "He was in his 60s and I was in my 30s, but there was no generation gap between us. (See http://www.ctsnet.org/home/astarr)

Starr "helped invent the world's first durable artificial mitral valve". He is "credited with being a co-inventor of the world's first artificial heart valve in 1960.".

2007 Lasker Award

On September 15, 2007, the Albert and Mary Lasker
Mary Lasker
Mary Woodard Lasker was an American health activist. She worked to raise funds for medical research, and founded the Lasker Foundation....

 Foundation announced the 2007 Lasker Award
Lasker Award
The Lasker Awards have been awarded annually since 1946 to living persons who have made major contributions to medical science or who have performed public service on behalf of medicine. They are administered by the Lasker Foundation, founded by advertising pioneer Albert Lasker and his wife Mary...

 winners which included 2 surgeons:
  • Alain F. Carpentier
    Alain F. Carpentier
    Alain Frédéric Carpentier M.D. Ph.D. is a French surgeon whom the President of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery calls the father of modern mitral valve repair. He is the recipient of the 2007 Lasker Prize.-Biography:A professor emeritus at Pierre and Marie Curie University, in the...

    , 74, Georges Pompidou
    Georges Pompidou
    Georges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...

     hospital
    Hospital
    A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment. Hospitals often, but not always, provide for inpatient care or longer-term patient stays....

     in Paris
    Paris
    Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

  • Albert Starr, 81, of the Providence Health System
    Providence Health System
    Providence Health & Services is a not-for-profit Catholic health care ministry that includes 27 hospitals, more than 35 non-acute facilities and numerous other health, housing and educational services in the states of Alaska, Washington, Montana, Oregon and California on the United States west coast...

     in Portland
    Portland, Oregon
    Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

    , Oregon
    Oregon
    Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

  • Ralph M. Steinman
    Ralph M. Steinman
    Ralph Marvin Steinman was a Canadian immunologist and cell biologist at Rockefeller University, who in 1973 coined the term dendritic cells while working as a postdoc in the lab of Zanvil A. Cohn, also at Rockefeller University....

    , 64, of Rockefeller University
    Rockefeller University
    The Rockefeller University is a private university offering postgraduate and postdoctoral education. It has a strong concentration in the biological sciences. It is also known for producing numerous Nobel laureates...

     in Manhattan
    Manhattan
    Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

  • Anthony Fauci
    Anthony Fauci
    Anthony S. Fauci is an immunologist who has made substantial contributions to research in the areas of AIDS and other immunodeficiencies, both as a scientist and as the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases .-Education and career:Anthony Stephen Fauci was born on...

    , 66, an internationally known immunologist


Steinman and Fauci will each receive $150,000 and Starr and Carpentier will each receive $75,000.

External links

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