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Professor LAO Tzu Hsi Terence

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Honorary Fellow Professor LAO Tzu Hsi Terence (2015)

Professor LAO graduated from Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong in 1976. He obtained his Membership of Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in 1982, Fellowship of Hong Kong Academy of Medicine in 1993, and Fellowship of our college as well as Royal College in 1997. In addition, he was accredited by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists as a subspecialist in Maternal Fetal Medicine in Toronto in 1992. In 2005, he was one of the very first Maternal Fetal Medicine subspecialists accredited by our college.

After obtaining his basic medical degree in 1976, Professor LAO commenced his training in Obstetrics and Gynaecology in Princess Margaret Hospital. In 1983, he spent one year in London and worked for Professor Michael de Swiet, the very famous obstetric physician, in Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital, as Honorary Registrar and Research Fellow. In 1984, Professor LAO returned to Hong Kong and joined The Chinese University of Hong Kong as Lecturer, and then promoted to Senior Lecturer. In 1989, he received a four years training in Maternal Fetal Medicine at The University of Toronto, at Women’s College, The Toronto and Mount Sinai Hospitals. In 1993, Professor LAO returned to Hong Kong again, and joined The University of Hong Kong as Clinical Associate Professor. In 2002, he was appointed by the same university as Clinical Professor. After his 15 years of service, Professor LAO joined The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2008 again, mainly focusing in research and training now.

After reviewing the career pathway of Professor LAO, it is not difficult to appreciate that Professor LAO had very rich experience with wide horizon in different medical practice systems, including our local system, European system and North American system. Also, he had experience in both service unit and academic units, and both medical schools in Hong Kong as well. In fact, his comprehensive experience is not just reflected by his clinical practice, but also by his academic achievement. Professor LAO has published more than 300 scientific research papers and book chapters, mainly in the field of obstetrics and maternal fetal medicine, especially in gestational diabetes, thyroid disease, liver disease, and perinatal infection with special interest in Hepatitis B virus. Among these papers, four papers were published in medical journals in China, written in Chinese. His research work has also been affirmed by numerous research grants and funding, achieving more than $7 millions HK dollars. Professor LAO has been serving as reviewer in 25 international peer-reviewed medical journals. He has also been invited for many guest lectures locally, nationally and internationally. In 2002, Professor LAO obtained his Doctor of Medicine degree from The University of Hong Kong, and the title of his 381 pages MD thesis was “The obstetric implications of gestational impaired glucose tolerance?

Apart from medical research, Professor LAO is also an enthusiast in teaching and training. He has great contribution in the medical education in Hong Kong, including the medical curriculum reform and direct teaching to the medical students. For postgraduate teaching, Professor LAO has supervised more than ten MPhil, PhD and MD candidates in the two medical schools in Hong Kong. He also served as Examiner for Postgraduate students in both medical schools. For clinical training, Professor LAO played the key role in establishing the formal subspecialist training programme in Hong Kong, especially in Maternal Fetal Medicine. During his service in The University of Hong Kong, he was the first Director of the Maternal Fetal Medicine Training Centre, which provided training for both RCOG and HKCOG programmes. More than ten accredited subspecialists and subspecialist trainees in Maternal Fetal Medicine in Hong Kong (including Dr. LEUNG Wing Cheong, our senior vice-president, and myself) had the honour of being trained by Professor LAO. Of course, Professor LAO has also provided clinical training to huge number of OG specialists in Hong Kong, including Dr. Ares LEUNG, our President, Dr. YU Kai Man, our Honorary Treasurer, and many senior colleagues in both public and private sectors. In fact, Professor LAO’s contribution in medical training is not just confined to Hong Kong as reflected by his appointments as Honorary Consultant or Advisor in various hospitals in China, including Macau.

Following medical research, teaching and training, I certainly have to introduce Professor LAO’s contribution to the development of our specialty in Hong Kong. Professor LAO served as Council member of our college in 1996 ?1997, and 2002 ?2004. He also served as chairman or member of various committees in our college over the past twenty years. Apart from our college, Professor LAO has been serving in many different professional authorities in Hong Kong, including Medical Council of Hong Kong, Council of Human Reproductive Technology, The Obstetrical and Gynaecological Society of Hong Kong, Federation of Medical Societies in Hong Kong etc. He also contributed to the development of midwifery in Hong Kong with his service in Midwives Council of Hong Kong and Hong Kong Midwives Association. In addition, Professor LAO has membership of 13 international medical societies or advisory panels, including The International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics (FIGO), and The Asia-Oceania Federation of Obstetrics & Gynaecology (AOFOG). Many of these memberships are by invitation only, illustrating the international standing of Professor LAO.

Professor LAO is a well-recognised expert in medico-legal issue in Hong Kong, especially in the field of obstetrics and perinatology. He is one of the very few medico-legal experts in this area and he has been invited to provide expert opinions in many cases by Medical Council of Hong Kong, Legal Aid Department, and the solicitors. He has also given a great number of lectures regarding the medico-legal consideration in obstetric and midwifery practice. Professor LAO never turns down requests for help in dealing with patient complaints and litigation cases, unless he considers the doctor involved deserves what he or she gets. In this regard I am sure that there are those in this hall, who are grateful to Professor LAO for his firm support and rational stand, that have helped to terminate further actions from patients making unreasonable, exaggerated, and even outrageous complaints, and related litigation.

Professor LAO holds the unshakable belief that, obstetrics represents the most important specialty in medicine. No other clinical specialty could exert such profound and enduring influence on an individual person, whether by brilliant diagnosis, timely prevention, appropriate intervention, wrongful decision, errors of commission and omission, or plain ignorance or negligence, through the management of one’s life in the womb. This view is now strongly supported by the mounting evidence and understanding of fetal programming. Professor LAO believes that the critical role played by obstetricians on the wellbeing of mankind, can be best summarized by his paraphrasing of Sir Winston Churchill’s famous words as follow: “Never in the history of human welfare is so much owed, by so many, to so few!?

Mr. President. Professor LAO has enormous contribution to our specialty, locally and internationally. He has made a lot of advancements in medical education, specialist and subspecialist training, clinical and laboratory research, and the healthy development of our specialty as a whole over the past 39 years. I strongly believe Professor LAO deserves our recognition with the greatest honour of our college.

Mr. President, I present Professor Terence LAO to you, for conferment with the Honorary Fellowship of our College.

Dr. CHAN Chong Pun
at the conferment ceremony in 2015