a story lives forever
Register
Sign in
Form submission failed!

Stay signed in

Recover your password?
Register
Form submission failed!

Web of Stories Ltd would like to keep you informed about our products and services.

Please tick here if you would like us to keep you informed about our products and services.

I have read and accepted the Terms & Conditions.

Please note: Your email and any private information provided at registration will not be passed on to other individuals or organisations without your specific approval.

Video URL

You must be registered to use this feature. Sign in or register.

NEXT STORY

Dr Jakubowski, Picasso and the sardines

RELATED STORIES

Mitral valve surgery
Marek Edelman Social activist
Comments (0) Please sign in or register to add comments

To taka to była klinika. I co jeszcze? Mówisz o kardiochirurgii, to szef miał takiego hysia, że musi być nowoczesna medycyna, a już się mówiło operacje, Brok już zrobił stenozę mitralną już to, już tamto, a ten Brok to zrobił bardzo fajnie. To też była odwaga i ten Moll jest w jakimś sensie po nim. Bo pomysł zoperowania, zwężenia lewego ujścia żylnego, tej... tej maleńkiej dziurki na rozszerzenie był dawno, ale nie można było tego zrobić, bo nie było wiadomo jak. Anestezjologii nie było, w ogóle to była tragedia. I on powiedział: 'To musi wyjść.' No i zrobił pierwszą operację w szpitalu X, oczywiście chora zmarła, bo to przeważnie kobiety chorują na to, i mu powiedzieli, że więcej nie. To on powiedział: 'Jeszcze raz'. To mu pozwolili jeszcze raz. I on zamówił w dwóch szpitalach dwie chore, jedną w szpitalu X, drugą w szpitalu Y, pod szpitalem X podstawił taksówkę, zoperował X i wsiadł w taksówkę i zoperował Y. I jedna z dwóch przeżyła. Od tego zaczęła się ta operacja i Moll też tak zaczynał.

It was that sort of a clinic. You mentioned cardiac surgery. The boss had a bee in his bonnet about modern medicine, and surgery was already being talked about, Brock had already done a mitral stenosis and this and that, and what Brock did was very good. That was a brave thing to do, and Moll is like him in a way. The idea to operate on this narrowing of the opening of the mitral valve, making this tiny opening bigger went back a long way, but it couldn't be done because no one knew how to do it. Anaesthesiology didn't exist, the whole situation was dire. And he said, this has to work. He performed his first operation in hospital X, the patient died, of course, it's usually women who suffer from this, and he was told no more. So he said, just one more time so they let him do it one more time. He reserved two patients in two hospitals, one in hospital X and the other in hospital Y, he had a taxi waiting for him outside hospital X, did the operation there, got into the taxi and operated on Y. One of the two patients survived. This is how this surgical procedure began and it's how Moll started out, too.

Marek Edelman (1919-2009) was a Jewish-Polish political and social activist and a noted cardiologist. He was the last surviving leader of the 1943 uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto. Following the Second World War, he took an active part in domestic and international politics, dedicating himself to fighting for justice and peace.

Listeners: Anka Grupinska Joanna Szczesna Joanna Klara Agnieszka Zuchowska

Anka Grupinska studied English at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland. She wrote for Poznan’s underground publications and was herself one of the founding publishers of the bi-monthly Czas Kultury. She spent 1988 and 1989 in Israel compiling reminiscences of Holocaust survivors. From 1991 to 1993, she held the post of Cultural Attache at the Polish Embassy in Tel Aviv. She moved back to Poland in 1996 and now writes books on Jewish subjects, mainly dealing with the history of the Warsaw ghetto. She is also a freelance journalist for Tygodnik Powszechny. Anka Grupinska is the director of the Centropa Foundation project in Poland (oral history project) called “The Witness of the Jewish Century¿, presents her own radio programme, “Of Jews and of Poles too¿, and teaches creative writing and oral history in Collegium Civitas and SWPS in Warsaw.

Anka Grupinska ukonczyla filologie angielska na UAM w Poznaniu. Wspólpracowala z poznanskimi pismami podziemnymi, wraz z innymi zalozyla i wydawala dwumiesiecznik "Czas Kultury". W latach 1988-1989 przebywala w Izraelu opracowujac wspomnienia ocalalych z Zaglady. W latach 1991-1993 pracowala jako attaché kulturalny w ambasadzie polskiej w Tel Awiwie. Od 1996 mieszka w Polsce. Anka Grupinska specjalizuje sie w tematyce stosunków polsko-zydowskich. Publikuje ksiazki (m. in. Wydawnictwo Literackie, Zydowski Instytut Historyczny, Twój Styl), artykuly prasowe (m. in. "Tygodnik Powszechny", "Rzeczpospolita"), realizuje projekty wystawiennicze. Jest takze koordynatorem miedzynarodowego projektu "Swiadek zydowskiego wieku" (archiwizowanie pamieci o zydowskiej przedwojennej Polsce), prowazi autorska audycje radiowa "O Zydach i o Polakach tez" i uczy warszawskich studentów sztuki czytania i pisanie tekstów literackich.

Joanna Szczesna, dziennikarka "Gazety Wyborczej", autorka - wraz z Anna Bikont - biografia polskiej noblistki "Pamiatkowe rupiecie, przyjaciele i sny Wislawy Szymborskiej". Od lat 70-tych zwiazana z opozycja demokratycznaw Polsce, wspólpracowniczka Komitetu Obrony Robotników, wspóltwórczyni prasy niezaleznej w Polsce: redaktorka "Biuletynu Informacyjnego KOR-u", Agencji Prasowej "Solidarnosc" i "Tygodnika Mazowsze".

Joanna Szczesna is a journalist writing for Gazeta Wyborcza. Together with Anna Bikont, she’s the author of Pamiatkowe rupiecie, przyjaciele i sny Wislawy Szymborskiej (The Recollected Flotsam, Friends and Dreams of Wislawa Szymborska) a biography of Wislawa Szymborska, the Polish winner of the Noble Prize for Literature. Since the 1970s, Joanna Szczesna has been involved with the democratic opposition movement in Poland, active in the Worker’s Defence Committee (KOR), the co-founder of the independent press in Poland: editor of KOR’s Information Bulletin, Solidarnosc Press Agency and Tygodnik Mazowsze.

Joanna Klara Agnieszka 'Aga' Zuchowska, urodzona 20 stycznia 1938. Ojciec zginal w Katyniu. Po wojnie zamieszkala w Lodzi. Studia ukonczyla w 1960 r. a specjalizacje z chorób wewnetrznych w 1973 r. Doktorat obronila we Wroclawiu. Pracowala z Markiem Edelmanen przez 15 lat. W 1982 r. wyjechala do Algerii. Wrócila do Polski w 1985 r. i mieszka obecnie w Lodzi.

Joanna Klara Agnieszka 'Aga' Zuchowska was born 20 January 1938. Her father was killed in the Katyń massacre. After the war, she moved from Warsaw to Lódz. She obtained a degree in medicine in 1960, qualifying as a specialist in internal medicine in 1973. Dr Zuchowska worked with Marek Edelman for 15 years. In 1982 she left Poland for Algeria where she remained for the next three years, returning to Poland in 1985. She currently lives in Lódz.

Tags: Russell Brock, Jan Moll

Duration: 1 minute, 27 seconds

Date story recorded: December 2003

Date story went live: 24 January 2008