For the world-renowned heart operation, a team of thirty surgeons, anaesthetists, nurses, and technicians was required at Cape Town’s Groote Schuur Hospital. At 5:52 a.m. on Sunday 3 December 1967, Professor Barnard and his team completed the first successful human-to-human heart transplant operation. They used the heart of a young woman, Denise Darvall, who was killed in a motor accident, on Louis Washkansky, whose heart was grossly enlarged. The operation lasted five hours and the patient survived, but he developed a lung infection and died of pneumonia eighteen days after the epoch-making operation. This had been brought on by the immuno-suppressive therapy, which reduced the possibility of rejection of the donor organ but weakened the defence mechanisms within the body. Professor Barnard performed the first kidney transplant done at Groote Schuur Hospital the same year.

The brilliance of his surgery was never disputed, but some medical critics of heart transplants pointed to the high fatality rate among patients and argued that his pioneer work had been premature, as too little was known at the time about the body's rejection of transplanted tissues. Barnard maintained these operations were justified if they lengthened people's lives.

Barnard's second heart transplant operation was performed on 2 January 1968 almost a month after the first, this time on Dr Philip Blaaiberg, whose dauntless spirit made him a national hero in his own right. Blaiberg lived for twenty months. Surgeons worldwide followed Barnard's lead, and by October 1971 recorded heart transplants numbered 178. Twenty-seven patients had survived, but only five of these had lived longer than three years. Forty-year-old Mrs Dorothy Fisher was given a new heart in 1969 and became the longest surviving patient. Shortly after performing his first two historic operations Barnard made it known that he was suffering from arthritis; his hands were becoming crippled at the joints.

Later Life:
Professor Barnard has traveled widely giving lectures and interviews. He was proposed for the 1968 Nobel Prize for medicine but did not win the award. He was appointed professor in the department of surgery at the University of Cape Town in 1972. He performed the first double heart transplantation operation at Groote Schuur Hospital on 25 November 1974. Fêted and honoured with seventy-one fellowships, honorary degrees, awards and decorations from many countries, the media sought him for his talents, zest for life and forthright views were always newsworthy. As an unofficial ambassador for South Africa, he won many friends. He did much to promote insight into the problems of death and dying. The question of whether to allow a patient to die naturally or to prolong an ebbing life artificially is fraught with clinical and emotional complexities. Although the medical association is officially against euthanasia, Barnard won international respect for his plea to request governments to legitimize it. He always contended that the quality of life should influence the ultimate decision.

Barnard was married and divorced three times. In 1948 he married his first wife, Aletta (Louwtjie) Louw. They were divorced in 1969. They had two children, Deidre (now Visser) and a son Andre, who died in 1984. In 1970 he married the 19 year old Barbara Zoellner. Two sons, Frederick and Christiaan were born from the marriage. Barnard and Barbara were divorced in 1982 and in 1988 he was married to Karin Setzkorn, more than forty years his junior. They had two children, Lara and Armin, and were divorced in 2000.

Professor Christiaan Barnard died on 2 September 2001 from a severe asthma attack while on holiday in Cyprus, Greece.

- South African History Online