Topics: African Americans, Black History Month, Civics, Civil Rights, Diaspora, Diversity in Science, Women in Science
Patricia Bath
Laserphaco Cataract Surgery
U.S. Patent No. 4,744,360
Inducted in 2022
Born Nov. 4, 1942 - Died May 30, 2019
Dr. Patricia Bath invented Laserphaco, a new device and technique for removing cataracts. It performed all the steps of cataract removal: making the incision, destroying the lens, and vacuuming out the fractured pieces. Bath is recognized as the first Black woman physician to receive a medical patent.
After completing an ophthalmology residency at New York University, Bath completed a corneal transplant surgery fellowship at Columbia University. While a fellow, she was recruited by UCLA Medical Center and Charles R. Drew University to co-found an ophthalmology residency program at Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital. She then began her career at UCLA, becoming the first woman ophthalmologist on the faculty of its prestigious Jules Stein Eye Institute. She was appointed assistant chief of the King-Drew-UCLA Ophthalmology Residency Program in 1974 and chief in 1983. Bath conceived her Laserphaco device in 1981, published her first paper in 1987, and had her first U.S. patent issued in 1988. Her minimally invasive device was used in Europe and Asia by 2000.
National Inventors Hall of Fame: Dr. Patricia Bath
Comments