Joseph Jordaan was only six when he embarked on a journey from home in East London to Cape Town to have heart surgery by world-renowned heart surgeon, the late Prof Chris Barnard, at Groote Schuur Hospital.
When Barnard made news headlines for performing the world’s first human-to-human heart transplant in December 1967, it was a few years after he had fixed a hole — congenital heart defect — in Jordaan’s heart through open surgery lasting several hours.
More than six decades later Jordaan, 68, is celebrating another successful heart surgery to replace a defective valve, this time from cardiac experts who learnt from Barnard at a hospital named in his memory, Netcare Chris Barnard Memorial Hospital.
“It was a profoundly moving moment as my colleagues and I stood in the operating theatre at Netcare Christiaan Barnard Memorial Hospital to perform Joe’s second heart procedure,” said cardiac and transplant surgeon Dr Willie Koen.
“There was almost no evidence of the surgery performed by Professor Barnard 61 years ago to repair the hole in Joe’s heart. The work was meticulous, and to this day, it continues to serve Joe well. This time, we were working on a different heart-related modification to replace Joe’s heart valve, close to the septum where the hole in his heart had been repaired.
“It was awe-inspiring and humbling knowing that the work of this incredible surgeon — who had operated on this same heart using very different technology more than six decades ago — lived on 22 years after he had passed on. What an incredible legacy Professor Barnard has left, not only for his patients but for surgeons like me, who were able to follow in his footsteps,” said Koen.
Born with a congenital heart defect when Jordaan and his mother, Sarah, took a trip to Cape Town in 1962 in search of a normal life for him, advances in heart surgery were limited. Little did they know that global cardiac care was on the precipice of a quantum leap.
The family would later learn about Barnard’s iconic status five years later, after he performed the first human-to-human heart transplant in 1967.
Though his life-changing heart surgery was more than 60 years ago, Jordaan still has vivid memories of it.
“My first heart procedure lasted me a lifetime, during which I married my wife Jean, and I gained three stepchildren and a daughter of my own,” he said this month.
Talking about his recent heart scare, he said, “I got such a big fright, but fortunately I got lucky a second time.”
While in the 60s he had two heart surgeries that took about six and eight hours respectively to fix the hole in his heart, and spent over a month in hospital, the 2023 procedure to replace his heart valve hardly took four hours, something which Koen attributed to the advancement of heart surgery over the past six decades.
“The most recent procedure was more complicated because of the previous surgery, which we had to keep in mind while operating.
“It's important to note that surgical techniques and equipment have evolved significantly since 1962. Today, most heart surgery can be performed using minimally invasive approaches, reducing the need for large incisions and the use of a heart-lung machine in some cases.
“Nowadays, open-heart surgery, which is almost a routine procedure, usually requires a hospital stay of four to five days. Once you’re discharged from the hospital, it can take six to eight weeks for your breastbone and chest muscles to heal as you gradually return to your normal daily routine,” said Koen.
He said the ventricular septal defect repair that Jordaan had, even by today’s standards, could be a complex and difficult procedure.
“Back in 1962, it would take several hours, and in Joe’s case — because of complications brought on by the complexity of the procedure. At the time, repairing a hole in the heart typically involved open-heart surgery. A large incision, often in the chest area, would be made to access the heart.
“With the heart still and blood flow diverted through the bypass machine, the surgeon would carefully locate and repair the hole in the heart using various techniques involving sutures, patches or other materials to close the hole. The chest incision would then be closed with sutures or staples.”
Koen said looking at Jordaan’s life, and how he would not have seen adulthood if not for the procedure performed by Barnard all those years ago, “and that he has now been given a second lease on life once more, that you fully understand the value and tremendous impact of cardiac surgery”.
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