Dear Mark, I cannot tell you how happy I am that you have included me in your apprentices, despite my long absence with infection and lung cancer (stage 1!). My work since I had to retire from heart surgery because of chronic active hepatitis C 23 years ago has been finding a way to restore blood flow to the heart when the coronary arteries are inoperable, and it has been a most joyful and happy time for my engineer partners as well! Never mind that this method was written off in the middle sixties, we obtained 100% success in our feasibility study and found out things no one had ever suspected existed. Talk about PLAYING! They both told me that they had never been as excited about any of their projects in the past, I couldn’t agree more! The ideas keep coming, along with the solutions, for instance, a gadget to pop babies ears when the airplane descends to land. Or diagnosing as well as treating the small artery occlusive disease of diabetics that make up about 40% of bypass graft patients, never before possible. Or treating the 100,000 patients a year estimated by the American Heart Association to constitute what they called the “no option” patients for whom the only surgical help might be transplantation. And on and on. A lot of fun, and a way that will earn a billion dollars annually for whoever leases the patent. Anyway, my goal is to build a surgical reconstructive hospital where all are treated without regard to finances, instructors who are the best in their fields, and participants who are residents or young surgeons, overlapping their two week stays, with resort facilities for their families, as well as schooling for patients families who live there also. Veterinary Ph.D. candidates who will do the research that comes out of these interactions,and patent attorneys to push through the ideas that are unique, with value, with the inventor and the hospital getting equal parts of the profits, and a portion set aside for developing new ideas which is so expensive. with an air ambulance system to rescue heart attack patients in shock, and reduce the mortality from 98% to 50% or less, and lots more. Will this qualify for Hamilton-America? This has all been put into my will years ago, so that if I don’t live long enough, it will nevertheless get done.
And finishing my identical twin’s idea about implanting a metal rod in the residual bone and protruding beyond the amputation site to fasten a prosthesis without danger of infection getting in next to the rod, and eliminating the socket problems that accompany amputees all their lives. He died of leukemia last year at the age of 81, and was unable to work on it during the last year of his life.
Anyway, I can’t wait till next month! Thank you for all you are doing for us! Ernie Feiler
