Peter Safar
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Peter Safar was an Austrian physician of Czech descent, born April 12, 1924 in Vienna (Austria), died August 2, 2003 in Mt. Lebanon, USA.
He is regarded as the "father of the cardiopulmonary resuscitation".
Peter Safar graduated from the University of Vienna in 1948. He married Eva Kyzivat, and moved from Vienna to Philadelphia, USA in 1950 for surgical training. He worked in Lima, Peru (1952), then in Baltimore (USA, 1954). He began to work on cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in 1956; he worked with the firefighters to design the first emergency ambulance, and wrote the book ABC of resuscitation in 1957. He established the USA's first intensive care unit in 1958. He next went to the University of Pittsburgh where he established the notable academic anesthesiology department. In 1966, he was deeply moved by the death of his daughter, Elisabeth, at the age of 11 from an acute asthmatic crisis. He initiated the Freedom House Enterprise Ambulance Service, the first paramedical emergency service in 1967. He also helped create the World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine in 1976. He retired from chairmanship of anesthesiology and founded the 'International Resuscitation Research Center' (now the Safar Center for Resuscitation Research) in 1979. He retired from practicing in 1989, at the age of 65.
Together with James Elam, he worked with the Laerdal company for the design of the CPR training mannequin Resusci Anne®. He was nominated three times for the Nobel prize in medicine. He was a peace activist and a member of the Physicians for Social Responsibility, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War and the World Federalist Association.
