From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishopen-heart surgeryˌopen-heart ˈsurgery noun [uncountable] MHa medical operation in which doctors operate on someone’s heart, while a machine keeps the patient’s blood flowing
Examples from the Corpus
open-heart surgery• But how do you compare open-heart surgery over that time period?• Sophia is grieving the loss of her sister, who died during open-heart surgery.• It was discovered in the cardiac intensive care unit where 10 children were recovering from open-heart surgery.• When he was 15 months old, he had open-heart surgery.• None of us had reckoned on open-heart surgery. 