Pioneer Chinese anesthesiologists: American influences.

FOR more than 2 decades after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, Chinese-American relations were antagonistic. The Americans have a long history, before the establishment of the communist state, of bringing Western medicine to the Chinese. However, with the “doors” of China closed after the “red” revolution, American influence should have waned, yet three leading Chinese anesthesiologists modeled their academic departments after similar departments in American universities in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The careers of Drs. Jone J. Wu, Deyan Shang, and Yung Shieh, all trained in midwestern America and who returned to China to create academic anesthesiology within their homeland, were largely responsible for the development of modern Chinese anesthesiology. With considerable effort, these men defined an infrastructure reflective of American anesthesiology, which is yet uniquely Chinese. Through their efforts, mainland Chinese anesthesia gradually assumed excellence in clinical and scientific research through education, publication, and professional organization, a blueprint they established and implemented. Accomplishments initiated by these pioneers were evidenced by the founding of a