NZ-trained heart surgery pioneer dies in Sydney aged 98

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A New Zealand-trained heart surgeon, Rowan Nicks, who was involved in the first open-heart surgery in New South Wales, has died in Sydney. He was 98.

The Sydney-born surgeon's involvement in 1957 came a year before Sir Brian Barratt-Boyes performed New Zealand's first open-heart surgery in September 1958 at Green Lane Hospital in Auckland.

He became a surgeon at the new cardio-thoracic surgical unit at Green Lane in 1947 where he helped pioneer cardiovascular surgery. He left for Sydney in 1956 "on the crest of the wave".

Shortly after the historic open-heart surgery at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, he received a government research fellowship, which enabled him to design the first automatic pacemaker.

From the 1960s until he retired in 1973, he spent a lot of time in developing countries operating on patients and training medical students. He travelled to Papua New Guinea, India, Russia, Iran, Malaysia, Uganda and Tanzania.

Reflecting on his career, he said: "I regarded myself as an uncomfortable catalyst between the old and new worlds ... I believed that medical horizons were limitless and that we should rise to the ideals of our profession."

He received a number of awards, including the Centenary Medal in 2001, and established a fund at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons to provide scholarships for surgeons from underdeveloped countries in Australia and New Zealand. His funeral is in Sydney today.