Professor Zbigniew Religa (1938-2009)

Professor Zbigniew Religa, the first cardiosurgeon in Poland to perform a successful heart transplant, died at 70. 

Professor Zbigniew Religa was perhaps most widely known as the surgeon who was the author of a milestone accomplishment in Polish heart transplantology back in 1985. Four years later he was also the first in Poland to implant an aritificial heart.  

Professor Religa was equally successful as a politician, first as a senator, then MP and ultimately holding the post of national health minister working hard on reforming the public healthcare system in Poland. He fought his political battles with uncompromising devotion, yet with full respect for even the staunchest opponents which earned him the nickname of a 'John Wayne of medicine and politics'.

Click on the audio icon to listen to the report by Sławek Szefs.