Proud Products of Texas Public Schools

Charles D. Fraser Jr.

Midland High School
Midland ISD

Charles D. Fraser Jr., M.D., is chief of congenital heart surgery and cardiac surgeon in-charge at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. His academic appointments include chief of the division of congenital heart surgery in the Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery at Baylor College of Medicine. Fraser also holds the Donovan Chair in Congenital Heart Surgery at Texas Children’s Hospital and has joint clinical appointments at the Texas Heart Institute and the University of Texas, Houston.

As chief of the Division of Congenital Heart Surgery at Baylor and co-director of the Texas Children’s Heart Center, Fraser has developed a team specialized in the surgical treatment of small babies, children, and adults with congenital cardiac disease. Fraser has developed dedicated pediatric heart and lung transplant and mechanical circulatory support teams to offer every available therapy in the care of critically ill children.

Fraser has maintained an active research program with specific interests in congenital heart surgical outcomes, transplantation, mechanical circulatory support and brain protection. In 2002, his team developed the first pediatric lung transplant program in the Southwest. He implanted the world’s first MicroMed/DeBakey® child ventricular assist device in March of 2004. Fraser has contributed more than 100 journal articles, chapters and textbooks to medical literature. His awards include the Outstanding Young Alumnus Award from the University of Texas in 1999, the American Heart Association Medical Honoree in 2002, and the Michael E. DeBakey Distinguished Service Award from Baylor College of Medicine in 2004.

Fraser received a bachelor’s degree with honors in mathematics from The University of Texas at Austin in 1980 and was a member of the Southwest Conference Champion varsity tennis team in 1977. He received his medical degree from the University of Texas at Galveston, where he was elected into the Alpha Omega Alpha medical honor society. He and his team have performed more than 6,000 congenital cardiac repairs and related surgeries.

“I grew up in Midland, Texas, and am a product of the Midland Independent School District. I marvel at the blessing of my public school experience. . . It would be grossly unfair and incomplete to suggest that there was one individual teacher that impacted me more than all others; that was the magic of my experience. Over the course of my education there were so very many wonderful teachers and I ‘hear’ their voices and lessons in my daily life. I can name every single teacher I had in elementary and secondary school with no problem. . . I met and learned to get along with a wide variety of kids during my school years in Midland. There is something about public school that is just different; children have to be a bit more independent and figure out that we don’t all come from the same background. I imagine it is better training for the real world.”

—Charles D. Fraser Jr.