Dr. Ding Shinn Chen of the College of Medicine Won the International Recognition Award from EASL

NTU College of Medicine Professor, and academician of Academia Sinica Dr. Ding Shinn Chen has been conferred the International Recognition Award by the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) for his outstanding contribution to the research of liver diseases. Dr. Chen was the first scholar from Taiwan to receive the award, and second in the world.

Established in 1966, EASL is the world's leading organization in the field of liver disease research. It currently has 28 members and attracts over 7000 participants for its annual meetings. As a high-caliber international association of the medical profession, EASL set up the International Recognition Award last year, and only two people have received the Award to date. That Dr. Ding Shinn Chen became the second recipient of this Award is ample indication of his scholastic eminence .

In his early years Professor Ding Shinn Chen followed the footsteps of the "Father of Taiwan's Liver Disease Studies" Professor Juei-Low Sung. Working closely together, they were instrumental in pushing the B type hepatitis research of Taiwan onto the world stage, and persuading the government to formulate a large scale hepatitis prevention and control plan, making Taiwan become the world's first nation to adopt comprehensive hepatitis B vaccine injections.

Dr. Chen is currently a professor by special appointment at the Internal Medicine Division of the NTU Hospital and also a chair professor at NTU, specializing in hepatology. The research of Dr. Chen and has colleagues has contributed to the understanding of the pathogenesis of hepatitis B, hepatitis complications, early diagnosis and treatment of hepato-cellular carcinoma as well as the prevention of HBV infection. His research achievements also extend to the development of a new and effective combination therapy for chronic hepatitis C. At present, this combination therapy has been widely used in the global medical communities and has saved the lives of countless patients.

Dr. Ding Shinn Chen has received numerous awards. He was elected academician of Academia Sinica in 1992, a Fellow of the Third World Academy of Sciences in 2001 and an honorary foreign member of the American Academy of Sciences in 2005. In 2007 he won the Presidential Science Prize. The EASL International Recognition Award which he won this year proves once again his dedication to research over the long haul and his outstanding contribution to medicine.