Juan Carlos Parodi (Buenos Aires, August 16, 1942) is an Argentinian vascular surgeon who introduced the minimally invasive endovascular aneurysm repair (EVAR) to the world and performed the first successful endovascular repair of an abdominal aortic aneurysm on 7 September 1990 in Buenos Aires. In 1992 he was the first in the United States to perform minimally invasive aortic aneurysm surgery (stent graft procedure) together with Drs. Frank Veith, Michael L. Marin and Claudio J. Schonholz. He continues to develop new techniques, including seat belt and air bag technique for cerebral protection during carotid stenting. He is recognized as a renowned pioneer in the specialty of endovascular repairs of the aorta.
Juan Parodi is also a political activist and defender of measures to alleviate poverty as well as promoter of the concept of responsible procreation and education of the most economically affected sectors in Argentina.
Biography
Juan Parodi was led to a career in surgery through his own interest and family influence - his uncle was a surgeon. In 1960 he began his medical training at the Universidad del Salvador, Buenos Aires, Argentina. After receiving an MD degree at the University of Salvador in 1968, Juan Parodi entered the general surgery residency in the former M. Castex Hospital which he finished in 1972. He did postgraduate fellowship at the University of Illinois at Chicago and following it did another one at the Cleveland Clinic with emphasis on vascular surgery. From 1975 to 1976 Parodi served as chief resident at the Cleveland Clinic, where Professor Alfred Humphries and Edwin Beven became two significant mentors in his career. It was during that last year 1976 that he committed all his wits to develop a new minimally invasive surgical technique that would change the future of the then infant specialty of vascular surgery and in particular aortic aneurysm surgery.
The conception of Parodi's new minimally invasive technique started in 1976. It was aimed at excluding an aneurysm using a fabric graft and metal components to affix and seal these elements in position using an endovascular retrograde access. At that time, the term “metal cage with barbs” was used rather than “stent”. The engineering of the first prototypes using elastic wires of stainless steel and the experimental work took place at the Cleveland Clinic, USA.
In 1979 he returned to Argentina where he continued working on the improvement of his minimally invasive surgical techniques. At that time, nobody paid attention to Parodi’s invention, which he continued to research without funding. By the mid 1980s, Parodi was having some success with his new technique in animal experiments. In 1988, Parodi met Argentinian radiologist Julio Palmaz, the inventor of the Palmaz stent, and Parodi began to use Palmaz stents in combination with his endografts on animals. From 1976 to 1990, Parodi did not receive any funding or support for his project.
On 7 September 1990 Parodi made vascular surgery history with the first successful endograft procedure in the world, in the city of Buenos Aires. The first human being to be treated with Parodi’s endograft was fairly high profile – a friend of Carlos Menem, the then President of Argentina also a patient who received an intervención bring presidente with a team of doctora Lije Alejandro Tfeli and Luis de la Fuente. The first device was simple, according to Parodi: “It was a graft I designed with expandable ends, the extra-large Palmaz stent, a Teflon sheath with a valve, a wire, and the valvuplasty balloon, which I took from the cardiologists." Juan Parodi invited Julio Palmaz to participate in the case at the Instituto Cardiovascular de Buenos Aires. That case was a turning point in the history of vascular surgery, changing the way most patients with aneurysmal disease are treated around the world today.