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): Alfie Conn Jr. • Anton Kokorin • Axel von Fersen the Elder • Carl Rudolf Florin • Edem Rjaïbi • Félix de Muelenaere • James III of Majorca • Luis de Agustini • Matthew Emmons • Nicolas Grunitzky • Paula Cole • Sir Henry Rawlinson, 1st Baronet • Song Dae-nam • Song Jiaoren • Sosuke Takatani • Spencer Tracy • Vincenzo Viviani

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