RUSSIAN DOCTOR BRINGS LIGHT BACK TO PATIENTS

When Russian ophthalmologist Nikola Vasilyevich Dusan came to China for the first time 23 years ago, his luggage was filled with surgical equipment and items that were essential to operations.

"In the 1990s, glaucoma and cataract surgery, which are general ophthalmological operations today, used to be available only in big Chinese cities, such as Beijing and Shanghai," he said, speaking through a Russian translator.

A graduate of the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia, or RUDN, in Moscow, Dusan was regarded among the Russian capital's top four renowned ophthalmologists by the '90s, when he began visiting China at the request of fellow doctors.