title: Top five medical innovations in China mainland since Xinhai revolution [1911]: results of AME survey-002.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This survey aims to scrutinize important medical innovations in Chinese mainland since Xinhai (Hsin-hai) revolution in 1911, which marked the end of Manchurian imperial rule and the beginning of China's republican era.
  
  
  METHODS
  An online cross-sectional survey was carried out during the period of Dec 29, 2014 to Feb 5, 2015, totaling 37 days. The survey was conducted on the platform provided by DXY (www.dxy.cn), which is the largest medical and paramedical related website in China. An email was sent to all DXY registered users to invite them to participate in a 5-minute survey. The participants were asked to nominate up to four important medical innovations in China mainland since Xinhai revolution. The participant could select 'zero' which means he/she felt there was no important medical innovations, or he/she did not know important medical innovations. It was noted that important medical innovations refer to (I) those with practical and almost immediate significance to improve healthcare; (II) should not only be introducing western technique to China, but those involve major improvement of existing western techniques count; (III) should not be those with important theoretical discovery but did not have almost immediate significance to improve healthcare.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In total 1,513 DXY users participated in the voting. Totally 489 (32.3%), 441 (29.1%), 342 (22.6%), 150 (9.9%), 91 (6.0%) participants provided 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 nominations respectively. (I) Artemisine (Qinghaosu) for malaria treatment (Project 523 team, 1972); (II) arsenic Trioxide (As2O3) for acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) treatment (ZHANG Ting-Dong and colleagues, 1970s); (III) limb re-plantation (CHEN Zhong-Wei and colleagues, 1963); (IV) all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) for APL treatment (WANG Zhen-Yi and colleagues, 1988); and (V) Wu's mask for plague prevention (WU Lien-The, 1910), were voted as the top five innovations in China mainland since Xinhai revolution, with 375, 96, 91, 53, and 8 votes respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this voting exercise, five achievements were voted as top innovations in China mainland since Xinhai revolution. However, only ATRA for APL treatment was accomplished after the ending of Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in year 1976 in China.
authors.affiliation: Department of Imaging and Interventional Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prince of Wales Hospital, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR, China.
authors.forename: Yì-Xiáng J
authors.initials: YX
authors.lastname: Wáng
authors.affiliation: Department of Imaging and Interventional Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prince of Wales Hospital, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR, China.
authors.forename: Fan
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Xiao
keywords: Technology innovation; dialectics of nature; history of science; history of technology; inventions and discoveries