A trace of sadness crossed the doctor's face as she recalls the words of one of her young AIDS patients.

"He asked me for my photograph. He told me that he would not be afraid to die if he had my picture with him to look at," she recalled.

These touching words were written in a letter to Xu Lianzhi, a doctor at the Beijing You'an Hospital. She had been taking care of the dying young man before he passed away.

The letter was found among a number of letters sent to Xu from many of her patients.

"For a long time, I had resisted opening the letter because I know I won't hear his voice any more," said Xu.

Xu read out this letter in a program recorded by China Central Television, where many of the audience were visibly moved to tears.

Whilst there is a deep, precious trust between Xu and her patients, this trust is not rare.

Precious trust

In 1989 You'an Hospital admitted its first AIDS patient and Xu Lianzhi has been building trustworthy relationships with those that have contracted AIDS and HIV ever since.

There have been times in Xu Lianzhi's busy, working life at the hospital that she has inadvertently pushed her own health aside, as she goes about caring and nursing her patients. She had cut herself and whilst she covered the wound with an adhesive bandage, her patients were much more concerned than her. Unbelievably, patients moved aside so as not to get too close to the doctor because of her wound.

"You must wear gloves first," her patients cautioned.

This kind of trust is in response to the respect, love and care Xu has shown them.

When Xu began to meet and treat AIDS patients in 1989, AIDS was still a disease that was very strange even to medical workers in China, a country which had been considered free of the disease until that point.

People had heard of the AIDS disease through sporadic reports in the Chinese media. However, a drastic lack of knowledge about AIDS led many people to be ignorant and sometimes bitter towards those with the disease.

Some doctors and nurses at the You'an Hospital were reluctant to touch AIDS patients.

But Xu was not afraid.

"Being a doctor, I am duty-bound to heal the wounded and to help the dying," said Xu.

Xu was born in Northeast China's Jilin Province.

During her childhood, her mother suffered from illness over a long period of time, and one of her younger brothers died from a common disease at the age of four.

Such personal experiences made her determined to become a doctor.

In 1958, Xu graduated from Harbin Medical University in Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province.

During the following 40-plus years, Xu Lianzhi has been engaged in the treatment of infectious diseases, such as hepatitis.

China has witnessed a rapid increase in the spread of AIDS cases over the last 10 years and Xu's life was closely related with the killer disease.

Love and care

To begin with Xu regarded her AIDS patients as being no different from other patients who had infectious diseases. But with further understanding she grew to know that for AIDS patients, love and care is just as important as medical treatment.

Almost all of her patients were weighed down by heavy mental burdens and were suffering from mental anguish caused by fear of death, being estranged from family and friends, and loneliness.

Such unbearable anguish is sometimes beyond the imagination of others.

As a result, AIDS patients are usually more sensitive and more in need of love and care, she said.

During the Spring Festival holidays of 1996, Xu Lianzhi was setting off to join her colleagues at a party to celebrate the traditional Chinese Lunar New Year when she received a phone call from a young man who suspected that he had been infected with the HIV virus.

Knowing that all patients have experienced a fierce mental struggle before they plucked up the courage to contact doctors, Xu decided to stay at the hospital and wait for the young man, who identified himself as Wu Ming.

Wu Ming arrived and told Xu that he was a homosexual and had not used condoms with his partners.

The results of the physical test was both ruthless and devastating to Wu -- he was found to be carrying HIV antibodies in his blood.

Although Wu had tried to mentally prepare for it, it was obviously very difficult for him to accept the test results.

More severe blows took place. Wu was rejected by his family after he had told them about his disease.

Extremely close to losing hope altogether, Wu began to drink excessively and refused to have any medical treatment.

Xu did not hear from him for a long time until late one night she received a phone call.

Wu, spoke to the doctor who he called "Mama" and told her that he was going to commit suicide.

Xu rebuked Wu in a stern voice in the hope that she would get him to change his mind. She asked Wu's friend to accompany him to the hospital immediately.

Xu waited in the cold for an hour. Finally, Wu arrived and was hospitalized from then on.

Wu now lives a happy, contented life. He runs a small shop to support himself, which also helps pay for medical expenses.

On Wu's birthday, Xu sent him a birthday card which read "The power of the mind is eternal and formidable."

Like Wu, many others who had once lost all hope have been given back their confidence by Xu Lianzhi.

Having been a doctor for over 40 years, Xu has experienced the death of many of her patients.

She knows that it is part of her job to be strong for her patients in their hour of need.

Once a patient has passed away, she tends to break off her relationship with the patient's family to avoid bringing back unhappy memories.

The only exception to this was a couple, who sadly both died of AIDS and left a 10-year-old child alone.

Xu still keeps in contact with the child.

Center for love

Over the years, Xu found that she needed to enlist support from the public to enable more people to understand about AIDS and to provide more care and love for AIDS patients.

In November 1998, You'an Hospital set up a support center called "Home of Loving Care."

Xu believes that the center is a bridge linking the outside world and AIDS patients.

Although conditions are much different from 10 years ago, many ordinary people are still ignorant about details of the disease. To many people with AIDS still are to be avoided at all costs.

One of the tasks of the "Home of Loving Care" is to give those who are more understanding about AIDS patients a chance to lend a helping hand.

According to Xu, currently more than 400 volunteers help out at the center at different intervals.

Xu firmly hopes that society will become more concerned with AIDS patients.

"Our enemy is AIDS, not AIDS patients," said the doctor.

(China Daily November 12, 2001)