Dear Members of the HMS and HSDM Community:
I write to share the sad news that Paul S. Russell, the John Homans Distinguished Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, has passed away at the remarkable age of 101.
Paul was a legendary figure at Harvard Medical School and highly influential in the field of transplantation surgery, having initiated clinical transplantation at Mass General with its first kidney transplant in 1963. As chief of surgery at Mass General, he helped plan and build the North Building (now known as the Gray Building) to satisfy the need for operating rooms in a central location. He also negotiated the creation of a pediatric burn institute, in collaboration with the Shriners Children’s Boston, for the study and treatment of burns in children.
When Paul Russell was born in 1925, penicillin had not yet been discovered, and surgeons had no effective antibiotics to prevent or treat many postoperative infections. Scientists likewise had not yet developed a framework capable of explaining graft rejection as an immune process. In this way, Paul’s life spanned the emergence of organ transplantation from a far-off aspiration to a fully realized medical marvel.
Paul received his medical degree in 1947 from the University of Chicago Medical School and had his clinical training in surgery at Mass General. After his residency, he served in the U.S. Air Force, followed by a fellowship with Nobel laureate Peter Medawar in the Department of Zoology at University College London, where Paul investigated graft rejection in transplants — an unusual area of study at the time.
A central motivation of Paul’s work would become improving tissue transplant outcomes. He fostered research to advance the field of transplantation biology, efforts that led to the establishment of Mass General’s Center for Transplantation Sciences, which today comprises approximately 80 faculty and staff across 19 laboratories, where scientists conduct state-of-the-art research to increase the success rates of transplantation and meet the critical demand for organ and bone marrow transplantation. He was director of the Mass General Transplantation Unit from 1968 to 1990, and in 1998, he was named the John Homans Distinguished Professor of Surgery, the fifth incumbent of the chair.
In 1968, Paul founded the Boston Interhospital Organ Bank, serving as the first chairman of its board of trustees. The bank has since become New England Donor Services, a nonprofit organization that maintains a large database and recovers organs and tissues on behalf of transplant centers that today serve more than 14 million people.
Paul was deeply devoted to Harvard Medical School, having served honorably as secretary of the Faculty of Medicine and chair of the Faculty Conduct Committee; Paul’s integrity, his dedication to safeguarding HMS’ legacy of great science, and the universal respect he was accorded all provided the gravitas required for such roles — particularly the chair of the FCC. Paul was also instrumental in a successful capital campaign to support renovations to Countway Library in the late 1990s. Generations of students and researchers have benefited greatly from the considerable time and energy he put into that effort, and the Russell Reading Room honors his legacy there.
In an interview with WCVB in 2023, Paul was asked what developments in transplantation could arise in the next 60 years. He replied: “Some I wouldn’t even be able to imagine, but I think in years to come, it’ll probably be easier, I hope, for the patient. It’s going to be wonderful.”
Since that interview, a multidisciplinary team of specialists at the Mass General Transplant Center performed the world’s first successful transplant of a genetically edited pig kidney into a 62-year-old man living with end-stage kidney disease. While even more advanced achievements in transplantation are no doubt on the horizon, I am glad Paul lived to see this one extraordinary — and indeed, wonderful — development.
Today HMS remembers one of its most illustrious figures. Our hearts go out to Paul’s family, friends, mentees, and colleagues in this difficult time of loss.
Sincerely,
George Q. Daley
Dean of the Faculty of Medicine
Harvard University