To begin with, I would like to introduce a famous old Japanese doctor, Seishu Hanaoka, who contributed greatly to the development of anesthesia and analgesia (Fig.1 ). In 1804, Hanaoka succeeded in performing a breast cancer operation on a 60-year-old woman under general anesthesia by administrating an herbal prescription, named “Tsusensan” (Fig.2 ). The fact that such a major operation was performed under complete general anesthesia was a great epoch-making event for those days because no effective anesthetic method was available yet.
In 1864, Green Morton demonstrated successful general anesthesia using ether inhalation at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Hanaoka was ahead of Morton by more than 40 years.
After this, Hana oka performed various major surgical operations, including 150 breast cancer cases, with Tsusensan, until he died in 1837.
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