CUTLER, ELLIOT CARR (30 July 1888-16 Aug. 1947), internationally known for his work in heart and brain surgery, was born in Bangor, Maine, to George Chalmer and Mary Franklin Wilson Cutler. He received his A.B. from Harvard University in 1909 and his M.D. degree in 1913. He was a surgeon at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, and in 1915, at Massachusetts General Hospital, both in Boston. In 1916, he took an assistantship working in immunology and bacteriology at the Rockefeller Institute in New York City. During WORLD WAR I, Cutler was a captain in charge of Base Hospital No. 6. Later promoted to major, he received the Distinguished Service Medal for his work in the evacuation hospital in Boulogne, France. He returned to Harvard and Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in 1919, beginning his private practice in 1921. In 1924 Cutler was appointed professor of surgery at Western Reserve University Medical School and director of surgery at Lakeside Hospital, serving until 1932, when he became the Moseley Professor of Surgery at Harvard and director of surgery at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital. While in Cleveland, Cutler, collaborating with CLAUDE BECK, developed a surgical treatment, cardiovalvulotomy, for the heart condition mitral stenosis, a thickening and narrowing of the valve between the left auricle and ventricle which hampers blood circulation. Used only 6 years, this procedure opened the field of direct surgical approaches to not only chronic valvular disease but also other congenital and acquired mechanical heart abnormalities. Cutler married Caroline Pollard Parker and had 5 children, Elliot, Thomas, David, Tarrant, and Marjorie Parker. He died and was buried in Boston.
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