BACKGROUND
The JSSH's history dates back to the 1950’s.
- 1955
- Dr. Johnston, a director of the China Medical Board (CMB)of Rockefeller foundation in the United States, visited Kyushu University, Department of Orthopedic Surgery in Japan, instead of visiting China, for political reasons.
- 1956
- His disciple, hand surgeon Dr. Harry Miller, visited Japan to show a movie, tendon sutures -tendon suture by Dr.ML Maison throughout Japan.
- 1957
- The Japanese Society for Surgery of the Hand (JSSH) was founded by Prof. Tamikazu Amako at Kyushu University.
The first Hand Surgery Conference was hosted by Prof. Amako at Kobe Oriental Hotel.
Two topics were debated: hand scar contracture was discussed by Prof. Daiji Kashiwagi, Prof. Kenya Tsuge, Prof. Takefumi Morotomi, Prof. Tatsuya Tajima, and Prof. Kengo Nakano, and fresh tendon injury was discussed by Prof. Tatsuya Tajima, Prof. Kengo Nakano, Prof. Shotaro Mizuno, and Dr. Takao Miyamoto. - 1958
- The 2nd meeting was hosted by Prof. Shotaro Mizuno at Osaka City University. The second meeting started the practice of holding a general presentation and symposium.
- 1959
- The 3rd meeting was hosted by Prof. Torao Iwahara at Keio University. An abstract was published in Journal of Japanese Orthopedics.
- 1960
- The 4th meeting was hosted by Prof. Sachu Kono at Niigata University. Dr. Joseph Boyes was invited from the United States.
- 1962
- The 6th meeting was hosted by Prof. Toshio Kodama at Okayama University. The 6th meeting started the practice of holding case studies.
- 1974
- The 17th meeting was hosted by Prof. Yasuto Itami at Jikei University School of Medicine.
Dr. LW Milford, Dr. G Omer, Dr. PH Davis, Dr. ML Clayton, Dr. RS Bryan, Dr. JH Dobyns, Dr. JC Riordan, and Dr. JM Hunter held special lectures at the meetings, and the First Japan–US Hand Surgical Joint Conference (changed its name to the combined meeting of the Japanese and American society of the hand) was held in Tokyo, Niigata, Hiroshima, and Kyoto. - 1985
- Publication started of the Journal of the Japanese Society for Surgery of the Hand.
- 1986
- The 3rd International Association of Hand Surgery Conference was held, with Japan hosting for the first time.
- 1999
- The management of the academic society switched to the chairman system. The First Deputy Director was Prof. Susumu Tamai.
- 2009
- The practice of board examination started.
- 2010
- The society became an incorporated association and changed its Japanese name to “ 日本手外科学会”, removing the Japanese character “の” from “ 日本手の外科学会”.
- 2011
- The society was certified as a subcommittee of the Japanese Association of Medical Sciences.
The 54th JSSH Meeting, entitled “Earthquake Reconstruction Satellite Symposium,” became an online conference due to the Great East Japan Earthquake. - 2020
- The 63rd JSSH meeting was held online to prevent new coronavirus infections.
the society has 3,628 members, 1,023 hand surgery specialists, and 436 hand surgery–certified training facilities.
Reference: Yoshikazu Ikuta: History of Orthopedics 7. History of Hand Surgery Non-regular 50(7) 661–665,2015
English translation was done by the committee of public relations of JSSH and Dr. Ikuta gave us permission to translate into English.
