In Memoriam: Bill Cook,
Angioplasty Pioneer Founder of Cook Medical
Partnered with Physician-Inventors to Create Innovative Equipment:
the First Angioplasty Wires and Catheters with Charles Dotter
and
the First
FDA-Approved
Coronary
Stent
with
Cesare Gianturco
and Gary Roubin
April
28, 2011 --
William Alfred Cook, founder of the Cook Group global network
of companies and
a pioneer in angioplasty, stents and life-saving minimally
invasive medical device technology, died on April 15 of congestive
heart failure. He was 80 and for half a century was a leading
figure in the development of interventional radiology and cardiology.
Bill Cook
started his company in 1963 in the spare bedroom of his Bloomington,
Indiana apartment. Today, the Cook Group consists of 42
companies employing more than 10,000 people in the United
States, Europe,
Asia and Latin America.
One of Cook's first
sales forays was at the Radiological
Society of North America (RSNA) in Chicago, where he set up an
exhibitor booth, showing wires, guides, catheter tubing and other
small items used in diagnostic radiology procedures. He
had purchased a Bunsen burner which he used to show how to form
the catheters. A visitor to Cook's booth was a radiologist from
Portland,
Oregon,
named
Charles Dotter. Dotter had been working on his "crazy idea" of
using catheters not just for diagnostic visualization of blocked
arteries in the legs, but for treatment. By using progressively
wider diameter catheters, Dotter thought he could open these
blockages, without surgery.
Bill Cook
at 1963 RSNA
Meeting in Chicago
He called this technique "angioplasty".
A clip from
Charles Dotter's 1965 film, "Transluminal
Angioplasty". Dotter
wrote, directed and narrated the film.
Charles Dotter
and Bill Cook hit it off and Cook began making catheters and
wires to
Dotter's
specifications. Just two months after the RSNA, on January 16,
1964, Dr. Charles Dotter performed the first percutaneous transluminal
angioplasty, opening up the blocked leg artery of a patient --
and the era of interventional medicine began, eventually revolutionizing
the treatment of vascular blockages.
Dotter was without question the "father" of angioplasty, and
Bill Cook's new company was the first manufacturer in this
new field. Both men got along because they were plain-talkers,
hands on, part of a generation of innovators working out of
garages, spare bedrooms and tool shops.
To demonstrate his new technique, Dotter
made a movie in 1965, a short clip of which can
be seen here. He ends the film correctly predicting that
his technique might find its way into the heart. A decade later it did!
Dotter's ideas
were scoffed at by many in the medical community who felt that
vascular surgery was the best (and only) way to
open up clogged arteries. Dotter became known as "Crazy Charlie",
but he and Cook persevered and continued to improve
upon the equipment.
At that time, angioplasty was not widely accepted in the United States,
but a German radiologist, Eberhard Zeitler, started visiting
Dotter and he brought the technique to Europe where, in 1974,
a young Swiss German angiologist, named Andreas Gruentzig, attended
Zeitler's seminar. Within a short time, Gruentzig had added a
balloon to Dotter's catheter and performed the first coronary
angioplasty. In 1980, Gruentzig honored Dotter at his final course
in Zurich, before moving to the U.S.
At Emory University in Atlanta, Gruentzig brought in a young
Australian, Dr. Gary Roubin, who with Cesare Gianturco, went
on to develop
the first FDA-approved coronary stent -- which was made by...Cook
Medical!
A 1987 news
report from a local Atlanta TV station on a new
medical
breakthrough:
the coronary stent
By the late 1980's, the new subspecialties of interventional
radiology and cardiology had been launched. As stents and other catheter-based
devices were developed, open surgery became utilized less
and less and the era of medical devices flourished. And, as it did,
other medical device companies appeared. In his
2008 biography, "The
Bill Cook Story: Ready, Fire, Aim!",
Bob Hammel delineates the story of inventions, mergers, affiliations
and patent
wars that punctuated the next two decades. Eventually Cook decided
to cede the area of coronary intervention to others and concentrate
on the
peripheral
applications of these technologies, developing the Zenith Stent Graft
for the treatment of abdominal aortic aneurysms and the Zilver PTX
paclitaxel-eluting peripheral stent, both of which have demonstrated
great efficacy and durability. The Cook companies also expanded
into urological equipment, OB/GYN devices, and endoscopic instruments,
as well as real estate, travel, and aircraft services. Throughout
this era of change, mergers and acquisitions, Cook Medical remained
a privately-held corporation -- and, according to company officials,
the business will remain that way. Bill Cook's son Carl, 49,
has been named chief executive officer of Cook Group, with Steve
Ferguson
continuing
as
chairman and Kem Hawkins continuing as Cook Group president. The
2010 annual global revenue for the company was approximately $2 billion.
Although Bill Cook was listed by Forbes Wealthiest
Americans this year at number 101, he and his wife Gayle continued
to live modestly and to contribute to a number of historical preservation
projects in Indiana, as well as sponsoring the Star of Indiana
Drum and Bugle Corps, a traveling and performing group of young people.
He even produced a Broadway musical, "Blast!" which won a Tony and
an Emmy in 2001. His love of music extended to becoming the benefactor
for the Cook Music
Library,
recognized
as
one of the
largest
academic
music
libraries
in the world, at the Jacobs School of Music and
Bloomington Campus of Indiana University. In addition, Cook companies
have provided significant financial support to universities, hospitals
and physicians throughout the country in order to aid the
advancement of education and medical research.
To honor Bill Cook, the company has set up a
web site for people who knew and worked with him to
share their thoughts and stories. As of today, there are over 350
posts.
