Dissection
Human dissections were carried out by the Greek physicians Herophilus of Chalcedon and Erasistratus of Chios in the early part of the third century BC. During this period, the first exploration into full human anatomy was performed rather than a base knowledge gained from 'problem-solution' delving. While there was a deep taboo in Greek culture concerning human dissection, there was at the time a strong push by the Ptolemaic government to build Alexandria into a hub of scientific study. For a time, Roman law forbade dissection and autopsy of the human body, so physicians had to use other cadavers. Galen, for example, dissected the Barbary macaque and other primates, assuming their anatomy was basically the same as that of humans.
Stapedectomy
The world's first stapedectomy is credited to Dr. John J.Shea Jr. who performed it in May 1956 on a 54-year-old housewife who could no longer hear even with a hearing aid. Significant contributions to modern stapedectomy techniques were then made by the late Dr. Antonio De La Cruz of the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles; by the late Professor Henri André Martin of the Hôpital Edouard Herriot in Lyon, France, including calibrated platinotomy (stapes footplate rather than whole surgery) and trans-footplate piston surgery that also paved the way for modern stapedotomy; and by the late Dr. Jean-René Causse of the eponymous clinic in Béziers, France, who pioneered the use of Teflon piston prostheses (also critical progress for stapedotomy) and, with his late son Dr. Jean-Bernard Causse, the reattachment of the stapedius muscle alongside the use of veinous grafts.