It is with great sadness, yet immense reverence, that we report the passing of Dr. Roy Edward Carter Jr. He passed away on January 28, 2021 peacefully at home.
Dr. Carter’s passing has a huge impact on our Avery family as he was one of the pioneers in diaphragm pacing. Indeed, in 1971, our first commercial Avery Diaphragm pacer was surgically implanted at Texas Institute for Rehabilitation and Research (TIRR) under his Spinal Cord Injury treatment.
We attribute Avery’s 50-year history of diaphragm pacing to Dr. Carter’s tireless effort to improve the quality of life of those with spinal cord injury. In September 1960, he began his career at TIIRR and continued to become the director of the spinal cord injury treatment program.
Dr. Carter was well respected in the spinal cord injury community becoming internationally known for his work with those who were ventilator dependent. In 1982, he was then promoted to professor of Rehab at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Carter was one of the founding members and president of the American Spinal Cord Injury Association and in 1991 received the ASIA lifetime achievement award.
He was with TIRR and BCM for 39 years and retired September 1, 1999. We are forever grateful for his dedicated work on diaphragm pacing.
