No miracles on the front line, just care

When Chung Chin-hung took over the Prince of Wales Hospital emergency room in 1984, the operating procedure was very different from today.

For a start, the room was full of interns and junior doctors waiting to be trained as specialists in other fields. And patients were only offered minimal service, being referred to other departments almost as soon as their initial check-up was over.

Chung, who has been hailed as 'Hong Kong's father of emergency medicine', was the driving force in propelling this first line of care into a specialty in 1997. In recognition of his contribution, Chung was awarded the Hospital Authority's Outstanding Staff Award this year.

'The emergency room is an exciting place because you see people from all walks of life in life-and-death situations,' he says.

Chung began his career as a surgeon in the 1970s and became the city's first emergency medicine consultant in 1984.

One of the most memorable cases of his career was working at Wan Chai's Tang Shiu Kin Hospital after the Lan Kwai Fong stampede that left 20 people dead and 100 injured on New Year's Eve 1992. 'Many were already dead when they arrived at the hospital,' he says. 'I felt bad, as I could not do anything to help.'

Chung says this feeling of helplessness comes with the job. 'We see people [in a terrible state] after traffic accidents. But we are not fairies and cannot perform miracles.'