{"id":276,"date":"2007-11-30T07:54:46","date_gmt":"2007-11-30T12:54:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/11\/30\/a-very-memorable-letter-from-dr-donald-ross\/"},"modified":"2025-05-14T08:11:54","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T13:11:54","slug":"a-very-memorable-letter-from-dr-donald-ross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/11\/30\/a-very-memorable-letter-from-dr-donald-ross\/","title":{"rendered":"A Very Memorable Letter From Dr. Donald Ross, Inventor Of The Ross Procedure"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Last night, I drove up to my house after a very, very, very lonnnnnng day of work. The past twelve hours were filled with hundreds of emails, several conference calls, Los Angeles traffic, etc. Little did I know&#8230; My mailbox was holding a short, one page letter that would bring me to tears. I was on the phone with Rob, a good friend, as I flipped through the daily junk-mail that advertised everything from built-in cabinets, to the local Indian restaurant, to Direct TV.<\/p>\n<p>Then, I saw it.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/Images\/ross-letter-400.gif\" alt=\"Letter From Dr. Donald Ross To Adam Pick\" width=\"400\" height=\"550\" \/><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I have to call you back,&#8221; I said to Rob, &#8220;There is a letter in my hand from Dr. Donald Ross.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For those of you who don&#8217;t know me, I had a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/ross-procedure-aortic-disease\">Ross Procedure Operation<\/a> a few years back. Dr. Vaughn Starnes performed the complex surgery which replaced both the aortic and pulmonary valves of my heart.<\/p>\n<p>After a challenging recovery, I am now doing very well. I am <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/03\/06\/open-heart-surgery-recovery-update-surfs-up\/\">surfing again<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/07\/27\/scuba-diving-after-heart-valve-surgery\/\">scuba diving again<\/a> and I just got married. To help other heart valve surgery patients, I wrote a book called <em>The Patient&#8217;s Guide To Heart Valve Surgery<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/Images\/donald-ross.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Donald Ross\" width=\"220\" height=\"213\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>That said, I was holding a personal note from the inventor of the Ross Procedure, Dr. Donald Ross. As I peeled back the envelope, I remembered <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/10\/23\/i-met-dr-donald-ross-earlier-today-ross-procedure-inventor\/\">my phone call with Dr. Ross<\/a> a few weeks back. He is quite an amazing man.<\/p>\n<p>The letter unfolded in my hands&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Needless to say, I was touched, moved and inspired as I read the note.<\/p>\n<p>To think&#8230; Dr. Donald Ross &#8220;thanks&#8221; me for writing my book.<\/p>\n<p>To think&#8230; Dr. Donald Ross writes that he will &#8220;find my book useful in explaining the surgery&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>To think&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>I never, ever, ever, everrrrrrr fathomed this as a possibility. Especially, considering my thanks to him is boundary-less. Because of Dr. Ross, and his innovative thoughts on cardiac surgery, I am now living a full, healthy life again.<\/p>\n<p>I should be the one thanking him, don&#8217;t you think?<\/p>\n<p>Related Link:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2007\/10\/23\/i-met-dr-donald-ross-earlier-today-ross-procedure-inventor\/\">Dr. Donald Ross and I Talk On The Phone<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Keep on tickin!<br \/>\nAdam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ross-procedure"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41301,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276\/revisions\/41301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}