Thomas Dao

Ling Yuan "Thomas" Dao (1921 to 2009) was a Chinese American physician and surgeon who specialized in breast cancer, its causes and its treatment. Born in Suzhou, China, he studied at Soochow University and at Saint John's University in Shanghai, then went to the United States in 1949 for a surgical residency and adopted the name Thomas. At the University of Chicago he assisted Charles Brenton Huggins in studying how hormones relate to cancer. From 1957 to 1988 he served at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center in Buffalo, New York, where he directed the breast surgery department. His research showed that more conservative operations, removing much smaller portions of tissue, were as effective as radical mastectomy, and he advocated breast self-examination and mammography for early detection. In 1974 he performed the modified radical mastectomy for the patient activist Rose Kushner and endorsed her 1975 book.