Alfred Blalock

Alfred Blalock was an American surgeon most noted for his work on the medical condition of shock as well as tetralogy of Fallot – commonly known as blue baby syndrome. He created, with assistance from his research and laboratory assistant Vivien Thomas and pediatric cardiologist Helen Taussig, the Blalock–Thomas–Taussig shunt, a surgical procedure to relieve the cyanosis from tetralogy of Fallot. This operation ushered in the modern era of cardiac surgery. He worked at both Vanderbilt University and Johns Hopkins University, where he studied medicine and later served as chief of surgery. He is known as a medical pioneer who won various awards, including Albert Lasker Clinical Medical Research Award. Blalock was also nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in Medicine.

5 April 1899

Born on the same birth day (5 April): Albert R. Broccoli • Alexei Glukhov • Arnaud Tournant • Björn Granath • Caitlin Moran • Emmanuel Célestin Suhard • Jean-Honoré Fragonard • Kaveh Rezaei • Mike McCready • Nancy Holt • Nicolas Grunitzky • Sandy Mayer • Vurğun Hüseynov

Born in the same month (April 1899): Alan Arnett McLeod • Aleksander Klumberg • Alfred Mosher Butts • Bertil Ohlin • Duke Ellington • George O'Brien (actor) • Gustavs Celmiņš • Harold Osborn • Hillel Oppenheimer • Mary Petty • Minoru Shirota • Oscar Rabin • Osman Achmatowicz • Randall Thompson • Robert Casadesus • Vladimir Nabokov • Walter Lantz