Robert Berger (surgeon)

Berger played a leading role in numerous pioneering surgical procedures of the heart and lungs. In 1965, he assisted in the first case of a total exchange of blood in a young patient. He also broke ground in the understanding of lung volume reduction surgery, and he helped to develop that procedure.^[1]

Berger was one of the notable physicians whose work led to the development of an artificial heart. In 1978, Berger headed the team working with a patient who became the first to survive the implantation of a partial artificial heart.^[2] At the Boston University School of Medicine, Berger reported that he and his colleagues saved the life of a heart attack victim with the installation of a partial artificial heart device known as the Left Ventricular Assist Device.^[3]

Starting in 1990, Berger became an outspoken critic of academics citing the scientific experiments conducted on concentration camp prisoners in Nazi Germany. In a study he published that year, Berger argued that, despite numerous citations in the scientific literature, such experiments contained scientific inconsistencies, improper methods, and apparent data falsification.^[1][4][5]

Berger eventually became director of clinical research in the division of thoracic surgery and interventional pulmonology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.^[1]

Berger was married to a fellow doctor, Patricia Downs Berger, and had two daughters, Shana and Ilana. He died in 2016 at age 86.^[1][6]

I learned during the war that every material thing you have can be taken away from you, but what you have in your head is yours always.^[2]

— Robert Berger