© Hong Kong Academy of Medicine. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
REMINISCENCE: ARTEFACTS FROM THE HONG KONG MUSEUM OF MEDICAL SCIENCES
Suyin Han and medical practice in the early 1950s Hong Kong
TW Wong, FHKAM (Emergency Medicine)
Members, Education and Research Committee, Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences Society
Full paper in PDF
Suyin Han (韓素音, 1917–2012) was a renowned
doctor and author. Her 1952 novel A Many-Splendoured Thing was adapted into an Oscar-winning
Hollywood movie Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing, bringing her worldwide fame. The story depicts the love affair between a female doctor
and a male war correspondent in Hong Kong during
1949 and 1950.1
Han was born Rosalie Matilda Kuanghu Chou
(周光瑚) in Henan, China in 1917 to a railway
engineer father and a Belgian mother. She was known
as Elizabeth Tang after marrying Paohuang Tang,
a Kuomintang military officer, in 1938. While in
London for her husband’s work as a military attaché
to the United Kingdom, Han attended the Royal
Free Hospital School of Medicine. Paohuang Tang
died in 1947 during the civil war in China. Upon
receiving her medical degree from the University of
London the following year, Han wished to move to
Hong Kong to be close to China.2 Serendipitously,
she was introduced to Prof Gordon King, then head
of obstetrics and gynaecology at The University of
Hong Kong, who was visiting London at the time. He
secured her a job in Hong Kong.
Between 1949 and 1952, Han worked at Queen
Mary Hospital, an experience she drew on for her
autobiography My House Has Two Doors. The book
contains vivid descriptions of the medical landscape
in the early post-war era when Hong Kong was
flooded with refugees from the mainland.
In her first role at the hospital as an assistant
in the obstetrics and gynaecology department,
Han worked alongside Dr Daphne Chun (who later
succeeded Prof King as the first local professor),
whom Han greatly admired:
‘Daphne’s hands were a marvel; tiny and so
able, so nimble! She was quite happy operating all
day, and I both envied and resented her enthusiasm,
the beam upon her face when yet another belly had to
be opened…’3
Gynaecological work was somewhat different
in those days:
‘Many a young girl is still brought to me to be
examined before marriage. Many times a week I
write a certificate beginning: “I...certify this girl to be
a virgin.”’4
Realising gynaecology was not her vocation, Han joined the pathology department as a
demonstrator, working under Prof Pao-chang Hou,
in February 1950 (Fig). She was assigned to study
liver pathology and observed the professor’s work.
‘As for Hou Paochang, there was ecstasy upon
his face as he plunged his hands into a corpse and
palpated an unsuspected cancer.’5
Figure. Staff of the Department of Pathology of The University of Hong Kong, taken outside the School of Pathology in 1950. Sitting in the front row are Dr CT Huang (left), Suyin Han (second from left), Prof Pao-chang Hou (middle) and Dr Olaf Skinsnes (right). Image courtesy of the Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences
‘The livers we examined were very often gorged
with flukes…Like a stream of swimmers the grey-brown
parasites came lizarding down when we
opened gall bladders and bile ducts, and Hou would
wade in joyfully with gloved hands shouting, “Ha, ha”.
He was looking for possible cancerous or precancerous
changes due to the flukes, since liver cancer was also
very prevalent in the fluke-infested regions of South
China.’6
Leprosy was prevalent then. Dr Olaf Skinsnes
(Fig), who was destined to teach in China, joined the
pathology department in 1949 as he was stranded
in Hong Kong. There, he began his research on the
pathology and immunology of leprosy, eventually
becoming an international expert in the disease. He
co-founded the Hay Ling Chau Leprosarium.7
‘In that winter, lepers were batted back and
forth across the border with China. The Chinese
pushed them into Hong Kong; they were found,
brought to hospital, certified lepers, pushed back
across the border.’8
Han changed track again in May 1950 when the
post of casualty officer fell vacant. She applied for two
reasons: first, she wanted to return to clinical work
and second, the benefits included a government flat.
She was appointed women’s assistant medical officer
in July and oversaw the casualty department despite
being a junior doctor with no prior experience. Prof
David Todd, then an intern recruited to cover after-office
hours, recalled Han typing furiously in her
office between patients.9
The rapid influx of refugees kept the casualty
department busy with around 90 cases a day.
Infections, particularly pulmonary tuberculosis,
were common.
Everything came to Casualty. Rare cases of
leprosy, lupus, tetanus, enlarged spleen from long-term
malarias, syphilitics, tuberculous meningitis
(mostly children and very common in Hong Kong),
accidents and suicides, homicides, fishermen blown up by the dynamite they used for fishing, early cancers
and late cancers, pneumonias and jaundices and
brain abscesses and the insane…Everything uncanny,
impossible and fantastic came to Casualty.’10
Reflecting some of the population’s low socio-economic
status, there were many critically ill
children brought in too late.
‘It was a child, wrapped in layers of clothing. We
undid the layers, and the abdomen appeared. There
was practically nothing else but glistening abdomen,
enormously distended, semi-transparent, netted in
a lace pattern of veins, looking as if at any moment
it might burst like an overblown balloon. Around
the navel were a dozen of those round brown marks,
like owls’ eyes, which the Chinese herbalist burns
through slices of ginger root with a wax wick, to draw
out the sickness. Above this monstrous sphere sat the
chest, a tiny bird’s cage; then the face of a miniature
querulous monkey, the blind wide eyes bleak with
dying. “How long has it been ill?” And the invariable
answer: “Oh, a long, long time...” “Then why did you
not come earlier?” And again, the same answer as
always: “M’chee...we did not know…The baby died in
the lift, on the way to the Babies’ Ward.”’11
In those days, operation of the casualty
department depended on dressers (male nurses),
whom Han held in high regard.
‘The dressers of Casualty were seasoned men
with tremendous experience…they knew far more
than many young doctors, and they also knew how
to save lives…They were cheerful, devoted and
immensely courteous to the patients.’10
What did Han think about her job as a casualty officer?
‘Casualty work was exactly what I could
do. Though looked down upon by more snobbish
housemen in medicine and surgery (because Casualty
did not lead to better jobs, it was a dead-end), it was
for me occasion for my talent in diagnosis.’10
In 1952, Han married Leonard F Comber, a British officer in the Malayan Special Branch. The church ceremony was attended by eminent guests,
including Governor Sir Alexander Grantham and Dr
Kok-cheang Yeo, director of medical services, and
the bride was given away by Prof Lindsay Ride.12 The
couple moved to Johor Bahru in Malaysia, where
she worked as a general practitioner for roughly 10
years before devoting herself full-time to writing.
She later relocated to Switzerland and died there in
Lausanne in 2012. Her legacy lives on through her
books, which continue to find new readers around
the world.
References
1. Han S. A Many-Splendoured Thing. London: Jonathan Cape; 1952.
2. Stafford N. Han Suyin. Family doctor, author, and a bridge between China and the West [obituary]. BMJ 2013;346:e8667. Crossref
3. Han S. My House Has Two Doors. London: Triad Grafton Books; 1980: 19.
4. Han S. A Many-Splendoured Thing. London: Penguin Books; 1959: 222.
5. Han S. My House Has Two Doors. London: Triad Grafton Books; 1980: 36.
6. Han S. My House Has Two Doors. London: Triad Grafton Books; 1980: 38.
7. Hastings RC. Olaf K. Skinsnes 1917-1997. Int J Lepr 1998;66:243-4.
8. Han S. A Many-Splendoured Thing. London: Penguin Books; 1959: 188.
9. Todd D. Foreword. Hong Kong J Emerg Med 1994;1:i.
10. Han S. My House Has Two Doors. London: Triad Grafton Books; 1980: 48.
11. Han S. A Many-Splendoured Thing. London: Penguin Books; 1959: 192.
12. Society Wedding: Dr Elizabeth Tang and Mr Francis Comber. South China Morning Post. 1952 Feb 2.