Wayne Quinton, inventor of the lightweight cardiac treadmill for medical diagnostics, is being honored by the University of Washington this weekend as the 2009 Alumnus Summa Laude Dignatus (the “alumnus worthy of the highest praise”).

Quinton, who graduated from the University of Washington in 1959, was involved in groundbreaking work as an instrument designer for the university’s medical school. He founded Quinton Instruments in his basement, manufacturing many of his medical devices — including the treadmill — that the university had declined to develop.

Wayne Quinton at Quinton Instruments

The cover story of the university’s Columns alumni magazine profiles the 88-year-old Quinton, who grew up in Rigby, Idaho, and was recruited to work as a draftsman at Boeing during World War II. He went to work at the University of Washington in 1949 as an electronics technician, and went on to head the medical schools instrument shop.

He collaborated with physicians on the design of a shunt that simplified the process of connecting patients to kidney dialysis machines — and teamed with Dr. Robert Bruce, who developed the first clinical protocol that enabled consistent and repeatable cardiac testing at an elevated heart rate. Quinton invented the first medical treadmill expressly designed for this application. The Quinton treadmills have become the gold standards for cardiac stress testing and cardiac rehabilitation.

In 1984, Quinton sold Quinton Instruments — by that time a 700-person company headquartered in Bothell, Washington — to A. H. Robbins. Quinton was a publicly traded company in 2002 (symbol: QUIN), and was one of the only medical initial stock offerings to go public that year. Quinton Cardiology Systems merged with Cardiac Science, Inc., in 2005 to form Cardiac Science Corp.

Quinton, renowned for bridging the fields of engineering and medicine and paving the way for the birth of the field of bioengineering, will be honored at the university’s graduation events this coming weekend.

Despite health problems in recent years, he remains active and, according to the Columns article, exercises at home several times a week on one of his own treadmills.

Photo credit: Jeff Corwin

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