Eighteen years ago, Dr. John C. Blasko took a seemingly failed medical procedure, improved it, and changed the practice of medicine.

He and his colleagues developed a highly successful procedure to treat a disease that has become the second biggest killer among men—prostate cancer. They are credited with introducing the first effective ultrasound-guided implantation of radioactive seeds into the prostate. “I never dreamed that this could change the management of prostate cancer across the world,” Dr. Blasko says.

Dr. Blasko and his associates have now treated 6,000 patients over the last 18 years. And, as of 2003, some 54,000 patients have been treated in the U.S. using the technique known as prostate brachytherapy.

This spring, Dr. Blasko, 61, will be presented with the Medical Alumni Association’s 2004 Honor Award & Gold Key. Since 1948, the award has recognized graduates for outstanding contributions to medicine and distinguished service to mankind.

“I am just sort of taken aback that I would be considered among a group of such distinguished physicians,” says Dr. Blasko, who is the medical director of the Seattle Prostate Institute, and clinical professor in the department of radiation oncology at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Dr. Blasko has already been named among the Best Doctors in America (in 2002 and 2003) and lectures around the world on the subject of brachytherapy.

His introduction to medicine came from his father, Dr. John J. Blasko, a psychiatrist, who was chief of psychiatry at the Veterans Administration Central Office in Washington, D.C., and the first commissioner of mental health in the state of Connecticut.

But it was an innate sense of curiosity about people and science that drew Dr. Blasko into medicine. “I simply wanted to seek the truth,” he says. “I don’t know that there was any luminary kind of driving force that attracted me.”

Upon completion of an undergraduate degree in zoology from College Park, Dr. Blasko enrolled in medical school and graduated in 1969. This was followed by an internship at Maine Medical Center and three years in the U.S. Navy as a flight surgeon.

In 1973, Dr. Blasko returned to Maine Medical for a radiology residency. “Radiology had an intellectual appeal to me: the dilemmas, the problem solving and the technology,” Dr. Blasko says. “But it proved to be a little too sterile.” His perspective changed during a rotation through oncology, a specialty he had not considered. “It was delightful,” he says. “I was actually taking care of patients.” Dr. Blasko focused on radiation oncology, completing his residency at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

In 1979, he took a job at the Swedish Tumor Institute in Seattle as a general radiation oncologist. At that time, most patients treated with prostate cancer had advanced disease, and surgical and radiation results were poor. A form of brachytherapy had been used sporadically, but the process required surgery and proved ineffective at accurately placing radioactive seeds. By the early 1980s the treatment was abandoned.

A medical journal article in 1983 revealed that a Denmark physician had been using a transrectal ultrasound to help visualize the prostate. Once he determined the size and location of the cancer, he inserted a needle to get a biopsy and seeded the area with radioactive pellets. But his patients developed complications, and he abandoned the treatment.

Dr. Blasko, however, thought the concept had potential. With better technology he could get a more accurate reading of the size and shape of the cancer. He also suspected that his colleague in Denmark may have used too much radiation. It would be imperative to customize treatment for each patient, he concluded.

In 1985, he and a small team of physicians began treating patients with a revised and improved treatment. To his surprise, brachytherapy worked as well as complete removal of the prostate. “Frankly, when I started this, I had no idea whether or not this would work,” he confesses. Nor, did anyone else.

Dr. Blasko further refined the procedure in the mid-1990s and in 1998, he and a group of physicians established the Seattle Prostate Institute, which today is regarded as the leader in prostate brachytherapy. “When you compare the results of this treatment with radical prostatectomy, the cure rates are equivalent,” Dr. Blasko says. The procedure is outpatient, can be completed in 30 minutes, and patients can return to work in three or four days with few side effects.

One of Seattle Prostate Institute’s missions is training physicians in the technique. “It is sort of like watching gymnastics,” Dr. Blasko says. “It looks easy until you try it yourself. Then you realize it requires some skill, and there is a learning curve involved.”

In addition to his speaking engagements both nationally and internationally, Dr. Blasko continues to meet with his patients and perform about seven procedures a week.

He never expected to make such an enormous impact on medicine. “I had no idea,” Dr. Blasko says. “My thought was that I would take care of people and have a rewarding, satisfying career. I am still astounded.”