Thomas Eakins’ 1875 masterpiece, “The Gross Clinic,” hangs in Jefferson’s Alumni Hall.

Jefferson’s surgery department is steeped in a tradition of pioneering and world-famous alumni. In 1825, Jefferson became the first medical college in the country to establish a clinic. Standard medical school curricula then consisted solely of lectures, making Jefferson an innovator in combining patient care with formal education. By 1877, the clinic had become the Jefferson Medical College Hospital, the second hospital in the United States to be directly associated with a medical school.

George McClellan, MD, founder of Jefferson Medical College in 1824, and its guiding genius for the first fifteen years, was the school’s first chairman of surgery. Dr. McClellan had previously served as personal physician to Thomas Jefferson. Following Dr. McClellan as chairman in 1839 was Joseph Pancoast, MD, a pioneer in plastic surgery. Third in the chairmanship was Thomas Dent Mutter, MD, best remembered for establishing Philadelphia’s Mutter Museum of medical history.

Succeeding Dr. Mutter in 1856 was the department’s most eminent leader, Samuel D. Gross, MD. Referred to as the “Emperor of American Surgery” in the 19th century, Dr. Gross wrote 14 books and 1,200 articles on surgery, general medicine and medical history. While at Jefferson, Dr. Gross was president of the American Medical Association (AMA) and founded the Philadelphia Academy of Surgery (1879) and the American Surgical Association (1880). Dr. Gross was responsible for devising countless new surgical instruments and techniques.

In 1889, William W. Keen, MD, became chairman and was one of the first physicians to operate on the liver and nervous system, as well as the first to successfully remove a brain tumor. Like Dr. Gross, Dr. Keen was president of the AMA and was widely regarded for his editing of an eight-volume surgery textbook, considered by medical educators to be definitive at the time. John Chalmers DaCosta, MD, head of surgery from 1907 to 1933, wrote the standard surgery text used through ten editions at American medical schools.

John H. Gibbon Jr., MD, with his heart-lung machine. A Jefferson team used the pump-oxygenator to perform the world’s first open-heart operation at Jefferson.

John H. Gibbon Jr., MD, focused international attention on Jefferson by ushering in a new era of cardiac surgery. Dr. Gibbon, Jefferson professor and chairman of surgery (1956-1967), is renowned in medical history as the inventor of the heart-lung machine, which made possible the world’s first successful open-heart operation at Jefferson in 1953.

In 1978, Francis Rosato, MD began his 22-year tenure as Chairman. Under his chairmanship Jefferson performed the region’s first liver transplant (1984) and hetertopic liver transplant (1988). Widely reputed for his skill and experience, Dr. Rosato has authored a number of text books, including one on surgery of the breast, and was instrumental in helping to establish intraoperative radiation therapy as a standard for cancer treatment.

Charles J. Yeo, MD ( Bio ), became chairman in 2005 after 20 years on the faculty at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Yeo's primary interests and research have been in the field of hepatopancreaticobiliary surgery. He has authored over 325 peer reviewed scientific papers and over 75 book chapters.