MaFei Powder—An Anesthetic

MaFei Powder was developed by Hua Tuo(?-208),the founder of surgery of traditional Chinese medicine. With MaFei Powder as a general anesthetic he performed an abdominal operation and set a precedent for general anesthesia, about 1600 years earlier than the first surgical operation in Western medicine. Hua Tuo was an outstanding practitioner, versed in internal medicine,external medicine, gynecology and pediatrics,and is also known as the founder of "surgery" in China.

Portrait of Hua Tuo from Li Dai Ming Xian Hua Xiang (Portraits of Chinese Noted Figures in History), kept in the Palace Museum