Pierre Grondin, Canadian surgeon (b. 1925)
Pierre Rene Grondin, MD (August 18, 1925 - January 17, 2006) was a Canadian cardiac surgeon who was one of the first doctors to perform a successful heart transplant. He was legendary in his surgical abilities and style and brought many innovations to the Montreal Heart Institute after his post-graduate training with pioneers Michael DeBakey and Denton Cooley in Houston, Texas. He was one of a select few heart surgeons worldwide who participated in the development of open heart surgery using the heart-lung machine in the early 1960s. He performed the first Canadian heart transplantation at the Montreal Heart Institute in May, 1968 shortly after the first successful heart transplant in the world in December, 1967 in Cape Town, South Africa by Dr. Christiaan Barnard.