In order to reduce the adverse effects of GA, nonintubated anesthesia has been recently employed to perform thoracic surgery procedures including coronary artery bypass, management of pneumothorax, resection of pulmonary nodules and solitary metastases, lung volume reduction (LVR), and even transsternal thymectomy. The results achieved in these early series have been encouraging. In Taiwan, nonintubated thoracic surgery has also been performed at Taipei Veteran General Hospital in a high risk patient with satisfactory results.