The surgeon who used F1 pitstop techniques to save lives of babies

At the Dutch Grand Prix, among the sports stars and musicians who strolled around the Zandvoort paddock and filled the grid was a different kind of VIP, Professor Martin Elliott, who spent much of his career as a paediatric cardiothoracic surgeon — operating on children’s hearts and lungs — at Great Ormond Street Hospital. There may seem no obvious connection to Formula 1, but Elliott was a guest of Ferrari, thanks to the relationship he has built with them for more than two decades after their respective fields of interest collided serendipitously one Sunday afternoon. Marc de Laval — a Belgian surgeon who was Elliott’s predecessor — in his research into a field of work called “human factors” discovered there were several theories around how people interact with each other either positively or negatively to affect an outcome. An investigation into a crisis at Bristol Children’s Hospital had found that the journey from the operating room to the intensive care unit was, in itself, dan ... Read full article.