Abstract
As many of our members are aware, our friend and colleague Dr Jaiyoung Ryu incurred a serious C4 injury while in Hawaii at the American Association for Hand Surgery (AAHS) annual meeting in January. I have obtained permission to discuss this and write about the incident. Jay is progressing in his rehabilitation as his family prays for his recovery.
As a little background, Jay is a professor and Chief of the Hand and Upper Extremity Service at West Virginia University School of Medicine in Morgantown, West Virginia. Jay completed medical school at the Catholic Medical College in Seoul, Korea, in 1977. He completed his orthopedic residency in Brooklyn, New York. He subsequently completed 2 fellowships in hand surgery at Yale in Connecticut, and Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, respectively. He started practice in El Paso, Texas, at Texas Tech University School of Medicine. Soon an opportunity in Morgantown, West Virginia, enticed this young hand surgeon to move his family to a more eastern location, where he has flourished since 1992.
Jay has been a consummate advocate and supporter of the AAHS throughout his career. Indeed, Jay was a member of the Board of AAHS and has served on many committees within the AAHS over the years (Table 1). His passion for hand surgery has been, and remains, second to none! Thank you, Jay, for all you have done for us and hand surgery.
Dr Ryu’s AAHS Committee Participation.
Jay’s 2 sons and his wife, Yonghee, are happy to announce that Jay was discharged from the hospital on April 7, 2017, and remains in California for now as he rehabilitates. Jay’s spirits are raised by the kind words from all of us, his friends. We wish him the best and hope he makes the most of his recovery. I, like all of us, long to see his smiling face and to talk about the latest in hand surgery once again with Jay.
We wish you a speedy rehabilitation, Jay.