Plastic Surgery in Malaysia | History and Development
The late 1950’s and early 1960’s saw the introduction of various
surgical disciplines into our young, recently independent country which
naturally first occurred in the General Hospital of our capital city of
Kuala Lumpur. Well defined surgical disciplines such as Orthopaedics,
Ophthalmology and ENT took root fairly rapidly and quickly established
their respective departments in that period. The General Surgery
Department while firmly established too, began to experience the
introduction of various surgical subspecialties in the form of regular
visiting surgeons from outside the country, particularly the United
States. The then Senior Consultant Surgeon in KL General Hospital, Dr S M
A Alhady, as the Chief of Surgery was largely instrumental for these
visits. A well respected and experienced surgeon, his foresight and
effort created a fertile milieu whereby young impressionable surgical
trainees were given invaluable exposures from these regular visits. From
1962 until 1965, visiting surgeons from overseas coming from various
subspecialties such as cardiothoracic surgery, vascular surgery,
urology, neurosurgery and plastic surgery took turns, each visit
comprising of two to three weeks operating sessions during which the
surgical registrars and trainees were given the task of looking after
these guests. Through these visits, the neurosurgery department was
established in 1964.
Dr Bernard L Morgan, a plastic surgeon from Jacksonville, Florida
came repeatedly for these visits and with Dr S M A Alhady, these two men
recognised the immense potential and the need for the specialty to be
developed permanently on a local basis. Dr Morgan went a step further
and graciously accepted two local trainees in his residency training
programme. This event marked the beginning of progression from total
dependence on foreign expertise to an eventual state of self sufficiency
for the country. Two local doctors identified for the programme were Dr
V Sivaloganathan and Dr S Kandiah.
Dr V Sivaloganathan, then a lecturer in medical faculty of University
of Malaya, was sent to the United States in August 1965. Upon
completion of his training and qualification in 1969, he returned as the
first plastic surgeon of the country. He went back to the university to
continue his work under the umbrella of the surgical department and
remained so until his resignation in 1973.
Dr S Kandiah came to GHKL as a surgical trainee in 1962 and as a
young registrar was greatly involved in those visits by overseas
surgeons. On completion of his final surgical fellowship exams, he
joined the residency training programme in the United States in March
1966, that is, six months after Dr V Sivaloganathan. After he was board
certified, he continued his stay in the United States to research in
keloids for a year He returned to Malaysia in the aftermath of the May 1
3 1969 riots. His plans to set up plastic surgical services had to a
take back seat temporarily in view of the political instability.
Grudgingly working as a general surgeon initially in the early 1 970s,
he voiced his discontent to his previous Chief of Surgery, Dr S M A
Alhady (who had then retired) and with the help of the Director General
of Health, his first specialist posting in the government service was as
a reconstructive surgeon in Sungai Buluh Leprosarium and secondarily as
a plastic surgeon in KL General Hospital. While his work was mainly
based in Sungai Buluh Hospital, he tried to make inroads in KL General
Hospital. His effort was not unhindered as other existing specialties
were not encouraging and he had to overcome many obstacles. Such a
situation was not uncommon as when a newer specialty like plastic
surgery was being developed, there was tendency for other established
units to curtail it because of competition for limited resources in
terms of finance, staffing and space.
To find plastic surgeons in Malaysia: Plastic-surgeons-Malaysia
Comments