ben carson

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Ben Carson (left) being announced as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House on June 19, 2008. Born September 18, 1951 (1951-09-18) (age 57)

Detroit, Michigan, United States Citizenship American Ethnicity African American Fields Neurosurgery Institutions Johns Hopkins Hospital Alma mater Yale University

University of Michigan Medical School Notable awards Presidential Medal of Freedom

Benjamin Solomon Carson, Sr., M.D., (born 18 September, 1951) is an American neurosurgeon. He became the Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital when he was 33 years old, and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2008. Contents [hide] 1 Background 2 Publications 3 References 4 External links //

Background

Carson was born in 1951 in Detroit, Michigan, graduated from Detroit's Southwestern High School with high honors, and then attended Yale University where he earned a degree in Psychology. From there, he went to the University of Michigan Medical School. While there, his interest shifted from psychology to neurosurgery, and after medical school he went to work at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. At age 33, he became the hospital's Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery.

In 1987, Carson and a team of more than 70 physicians, surgeons and nurses made medical history with an operation at Johns Hopkins to separate a pair of conjoined twins. The seven month old Binder twins were joined at the back of the head and shared the superior sagittal sinus, a vein that is the major path for return blood flow from the brain. Previous operations of this type had failed, killing both twins or saving only one. However, following some 22 hours of extremely complex surgery, the twins were separated and the operation was declared a success.

In 1997, Carson went to South Africa where he operated with a 50-member team in the successful separation of 11-month-old Zambian twin boys, Joseph and Luka Banda, joined at the head. The twins did not share any organs but did share intricate blood vessels which flowed into each child's brain. According to Carson, he had performed surgical rehearsals with a computerized, 3-D virtual workbench that allowed him to visualize artificial reconstructions of the twins' brains. The operation lasted 28 hours before reaching a successful conclusion.

In 2003, Carson was a member of the surgical team which