The following is excerpted from the Church Newsroom. To read the full report, CLICK HERE.
The records detail 7,000 surgeries done over three decades
President Russell M. Nelson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has donated his medical journals and research — 35 volumes in all — to the University of Utah School of Medicine.
The reports of more than 7,000 surgeries “may be needed in particular by any living patients in need of additional operations,” the Church president and former heart surgeon said on Wednesday, August 30, 2023. He spoke at a brief afternoon gathering with University of Utah officials in the First Presidency council room in the Church Administration Building on Temple Square in Salt Lake City.
President Nelson said the meeting, which was led by Elder Dale G. Renlund of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (himself a former heart transplant surgeon and University of Utah graduate), was “a historic point in my life.”
Those present included his wife, Sister Wendy Nelson, University of Utah President Taylor Randall, Drs. Sam Finlayson and Craig Selzman (the latter holds the university’s Dr. Russell M. Nelson and Dantzel W. Nelson Presidential Endowed Chair) and Katie Eccles of the university’s board of trustees.
“Whenever a surgical operation is done in a major hospital, a report of that operation is dictated by the surgeon,” President Nelson explained. “I kept copies of all my operative records from 1954 to 1984, when I was called to devote full-time service as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. … I am sure the keeper of these records will be mindful of the confidential relationships between doctors and their patients. Therefore, these reports can be made available on an as-needed basis.”
Eccles expressed gratitude on behalf of her family that the records will be housed in the university’s Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library.
“We are so honored that you have entrusted the University of Utah to catalog and manage these important papers,” Eccles said. “While they are there, they will be accessible to those who want to further medical research. They will be there to motivate new pioneering efforts in cardiology and, perhaps most importantly, to inspire young physicians for generations to come to use their gifts and talents as you did to improve the human condition.”
The volumes comprise 30 books of operative reports, three books of reprints of more than 100 of Dr. Nelson’s scientific publications, a master patient index and Dr. Nelson’s Ph.D. thesis. President Nelson also provided a digitized version of each volume. The only surgical reports not included are those done while he was a visiting professor of surgery in Mexico, Chile, Uruguay and the People’s Republic of China.
To read the full report, CLICK HERE.
