On Oct. 27, 1967, Dr. Lester R. Sauvage performed the first ﾓbloodlessﾔ open-heart surgery in the Northwest on a patient whose religious beliefs precluded the acceptance of blood transfusions. The eighteen year-old patient survived the operation and subsequently helped establish transfusion-free surgical programs at other hospitals in the state.

In 1959, Sauvage founded the Hope Heart Institute after he joined Providence Seattle Medical Center and Children’s Medical Center in Seattle. Sauvage retired from clinical surgery in 1991.