Hearts of Steel: Treating Valve Disease in Post-War Sheffield

In 1955, a Sheffield surgeon attempted what is now believed to have been the world’s first total mitral valve replacement. The artificial heart valve was made from Perspex in a hospital workshop.

This episode of The Overend Knight Medical History Podcast tells the story of surgeon Judson Chesterman and hospital technician Clifford Lambourne, whose work helped put Sheffield at the forefront of early cardiac surgery.

At the time, rheumatic heart disease caused serious damage to heart valves and doctors had few ways to treat it. Chesterman wanted to replace the damaged mitral valve completely. Working with Lambourne, he developed an artificial heart valve, moving from early copper designs to a Perspex version that could be implanted into the heart.

The operation in 1955 did not have a successful long term outcome, but it helped expose another major challenge. Surgeons needed a way to keep blood moving around the body while they operated on the heart. Chesterman went on to develop his own heart lung machine and used it in Sheffield in 1957.

Dr Will Parker, NIHR Clinical Lecturer in Cardiology at the University of Sheffield, explores this history with Professor Allan Pacey and Dr Abdul Hameed. They look at how medicine and engineering came together in Sheffield, from early heart valve replacement to the cardiovascular research taking place in the city today.

The episode shows how progress in heart disease treatment often comes from people with different skills working on the same problem, and how Sheffield’s engineering heritage became part of its medical history.