What are some Canadian contributions to medical technology/ medicine?

Canadian surgeon and hypothermia researcher Dr. Wilfred Bigelow.He discovered in the early 1940s that lowering temperature of an arm or leg also reduced its oxygen requirements. In the late 1940s he thought hypothermia might help doctors operating on newborns with heart defects—doctors who were limited to external repairs because interrupting circulation also meant dangerously interrupting oxygen supply to other organs, like the brain. In 1950, he and Toronto General Hospital colleague Dr. John Callaghan presented their work at a medical convention; in 1952, hypothermia allowed the first open-heart operation on a human. After the heart-lung pump came into use, the two techniques were combined. Today cold chemical solutions are injected into coronary arteries to protect the heart during surgery.

The first practical electron microscope was constructed in 1938, at the University of Toronto, by Eli Franklin Burton and students Cecil Hall, The actual inventor of the electron microscope was not Canadian. It was Canadians who made it practical.

Sometimes, children are born with defective hearts. So-called "Transposition of the Great Arteries" is one such defect. The condition means that blood does not circulate properly in the heart, leaving infants oxygen-starved. These 'blue babies' frequently died. On May 16th, 1963, Dr. William Mustard made medical history when 18-month-old Maria Surnoski of Whitby, Ontario became the first child to have what was to become known as the "Mustard operation" performed at SickKids. By putting a new partition in one of the chambers of the heart, Dr. Mustard made the heart work backwards, yet circulate blood to the lungs as effectively as a normal heart. Dr. Mustard was invested as a member of the Order of Canada. By the time he died in 1987, his operation had saved more than 500 children at SickKids alone, and thousands worldwide.

Babies born with congenital hypothyroidism (CH) do not produce enough thyroid hormone, which results in an extremely low metabolism. If not treated quickly and properly, the child can become mentally retarded. In 1974, Dr Jean Dussault and Dr. Paul Walfish developed a screening test for the condition that could immediately identify babies with this condition. As a result of this technology, thousands of children have been saved from mental retardation.