From 'Barefoot' doctors to medical pioneers

China's hospitals have been revolutionized by a group of former low-level practitioners from a small city in Fujian province, report Sun Li and Hu Meidong in Fuzhou.

Many readers will be familiar with the image of a pretty nurse with a sweet smile who adorns ads in newspapers, on television and the Internet, among other places, promoting the service of hospitals that offer cosmetic surgery and treatments for skin conditions and infertility.

However, less well-known is the fact that these same hospitals are run by a group of billionaires from Putian, a prefectural-level city in Fujian province, and a large number of them are even from the same town.