Levi Watkins Jr.

CTL-E-6731 · Person · physician · 1944–2015

PROVISIONAL evidence grade of this record

Levi Watkins Jr. (1944–2015) was a Johns Hopkins cardiac surgeon who in 1980 performed the first human implantation of the automatic implantable cardioverter-defibrillator, the device developed under Michel Mirowski for patients at risk of sudden cardiac death. He was the first Black chief resident in cardiac surgery at Johns Hopkins and, as associate dean, transformed the school's recruitment of minority students. He also played a central role in the hospital's reckoning over Henrietta Lacks.

Notes

Merged 2026-11-02 from the staged health pioneers packet (website/.build-work/scratch-v114/health/) under the GOV-006 founder gate opened 2026-11-02; the staged record is carried verbatim — no claim upgraded in transit (GOV-004). · Roles as staged: Physician — cardiac surgeon (Johns Hopkins) · Photo: Photo: Kingkongphoto & www.celebrity-photos.com from Laurel Maryland, USA · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Source: Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Levi_Watkins.jpg) · staged for CultureTechLens Full per-asset record in this package's photo-records.json, keyed to CTL-E-6731.

Sources

• Wikipedia, 'Levi Watkins Jr.' — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levi_Watkins_Jr.

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