Dr Anthony P.C. Yim was born locally and attended secondary school at Wah Yan College, Hong Kong. He started his medical education at Cambridge University from which he graduated in 1981 with double First Class Honours. He received the Hobson Memorial Entrance Scholarship to Oxford University Medical School where he completed his basic medical education and was later awarded Doctor of Medicine. Dr Yim received his training in general surgery and cardiothoracic surgery at John Radcliffe Hospital and Harefield Hospital in UK, as well as the University of Chicago Medical Center and Massachusetts General Hospital in USA. He joined The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 1992 and was chair Professor of Surgery, as well as Co-director of the Cardiovascular Surgical Research Laboratory before he left the University in August 2007.

Dr Yim is a member of over thirty learned bodies, holding leadership positions in many of them. He was the past Chairman of the Cardiothoracic Surgery Board of the College of Surgeons of Hong Kong as well as the past Chairman of the Cardiothroacic Surgery Specialty Group in the Hospital Authority. He is currently one of the very few Asian cardiothoracic surgeons who belongs to the elite American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS), the oldest organization of this specialty. He has served on the Biology and Medicine Panel of the Research Grants Council (RGC) of Hong Kong.

Dr Yim pioneered the development of video-assisted thoracic surgery (VATS) in Asia and it earned him an international reputation. He is the lead editor of the book, Minimal Access Cardiothoracic Surgery (published by W.B. Saunders), now widely acclaimed to be the standard text in this field. Has contributed to over 30 book chapters as well as more than 400 publications in peer-reviewed, indexed journals. He currently serves or has served on over thirty editorial boards of international journals including CHEST, The Annals of Thoracic Surgery, European Journal of Cardio-thoracic Surgery / Interactive Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery (as an Associate Editor), Heart Surgery Forum, and World Journal of Surgery. Dr Yim has been invited to be a visiting professor to many leading academic institutions both in China as well as abroad, including PLA General Hospital (301 Hospital) in Beijing, Tongji University in Wuhan, the University of Toronto, Stanford University and the University of Oxford. He has been frequently invited to deliver lectures including the Litchfield Lecture by the University of Oxford, Foundation Lecture by the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and Keynote Lecture at the Japan Surgical Society. In 1994, he started a training programme at The Chinese University of Hong Kong for thoracic surgeons from mainland China to learn VATS in Hong Kong.