Ivo Pitanguy

Ivo Hélcio Jardim de Campos Pitanguy (July 5, 1926 – August 6, 2016) was a plastic surgeon based in Rio de Janeiro.[1]

Pitanguy studied at the Bethesda North Hospital in Cincinnati, where he worked with John Longacre. Soon after, Pitanguy went to France and England where he studied plastic surgery.

In 1953 he began working at a Brazilian hospital. On December 17, 1961, a burning circus tent fell on 2,500 spectators in the Brazilian city of Niterói. Pitanguy treated burn victims for weeks on an emergency basis. He later referred to the event as life changing, as it taught him that for many, physical appearance was critical to living.[2] Pitanguy founded a private clinic called Clínica Ivo Pitanguy in the Botafogo section of Rio de Janeiro where he operated on clients and trained surgeons.

Pitanguy was also a philanthropist. He renovated a ward at the public Santa Casa da Misericórdia Hospital in Rio where, for four decades, he offered free treatment.

Pitanguy was a member of the Academia Brasileira de Letras and of the Academia Nacional de Medicina.

The Pitanguy clinic in Rio also includes an auditorium and library for Pitanguy's lectures and writings for medical students. He died one day after carrying the Olympic flame in his wheelchair, ahead of the Rio 2016 Olympic games.[3]