SurgicalIntegrity
A Grassroots Surgeon Bound for Moscow: April 2023 and the First Keynote by a Chinese Practicing Veterinarian
In the spring of 2023, a long-delayed envelope arrived that marked a quiet historical threshold for Chinese veterinary medicine: an official invitation to deliver a keynote on canine total hip replacement at the Russian International Veterinary Congress in Moscow. The trip had been frozen for two years during the pandemic, but in April 2023, the flight path was cleared. Standing as the first practicing small animal orthopedic clinician from mainland China invited to address their assembly, I packed my slides with one mission: to showcase the raw surgical caliber and objective data of China's frontline practitioners. As for delivering a complex orthopedic lecture entirely in English? I shrugged and laughed: "Giving the talk is my job; whether they can follow my English is entirely their problem!"