HOUSTON, July 12 (UPI) -- U.S. heart surgeon Michael DeBakey, who pioneered now-common bypass surgery and developed innovative pumps and other devices, has died at 99, officials said.
DeBakey died Friday night of natural causes at The Methodist Hospital in Houston, not far from the Baylor College of Medicine, a once-provincial school that DeBakey helped transform into one of the world's great medical institutions, The Los Angeles Times reported. He had undergone heart surgery of the type he developed there in February 2006.