Professor Yong-gil Kim at the Department of Rheumatology and Professor Gyeong-gon Kim at the Convergence Research Center together developed a biomarker that can diagnose the transition of the nephritis of systemic lupus erythematosus at an early stage.

 

The research findings are meaningful in that early diagnosis became available in a non-invasive manner before the transition of systemic lupus erythematosus into fatal complications of lupus nephritis.
This study was sponsored by the National Research Foundation of Korea and was published in the international journal, 'Clinical and Translational Science.'

AMC research team developed a real-time monitoring technology to observe the movement and survival of stem cells transplanted intravitally. This development is expected to take one step closer to overcoming intractable diseases, as it lays a significant foundation for the advancement of stem cell treatment.

 

The team led by Professor Dong-myeong Shin at the Biomedical Science Lab and Professor Myung-Soo Choo at the Department of Urology developed a technology using multicolor two-photon intravital microscopy for 3D observation and quantification of the movement of mesenchymal stem cells transplanted to rats with interstitial cystitis. The team also analyzed engrafted stem cells and successfully identified key factors involved in stem cell engraftment.

 

The research findings are published in the online issue of 'Biomaterials,' a scientific journal well known in biomaterials and tissue engineering fields.

AMC signed the Agreement of the Cheongna Medical Complex Town project on December 27 at Cheongna Robot Tower. The agreement was signed by AMC President Seung-Il Park, Mayor Nam-choon Park of Incheon, Mr. Won-jae Lee (Commissioner of Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority), and representatives of 8 investors to officially launch the Cheongna Medical Complex Town project. The agreement ceremony was also attended by some major stakeholders, including Mr. Kyo-heung Kim, a member of the National Assembly, and Mr. Eun-ho Shin, chair of the Incheon Metropolitan Council.

 

The Cheongna Medical Complex Town is a large-scale project with an area coverage of 260,000㎡ in Cheongna International City located at Cheongna-dong, Seo-gu, Incheon, which is twice the current AMC hospital site. The project involves building a general hospital as well as the facilities to be used for industry-academy cooperation, business, and commercial purposes.

 

AMC Cheongna is planning to start construction in 2023, complete in 2026, and officially open in 2027. The 800-bed AMC Cheongna will be established to achieve the following goals: ▲ become a global medical hub by building world-class specialized centers, ▲ specialize in treating high difficulty patients with severe symptoms, and ▲ apply a new paradigm towards a futuristic, intelligent hospital.

AMC research team led by Professor Joon-Ki Kim at the Department of Convergence Medicine and Professor Chan-Ki Baek at the Convergence Research Center recently reported that they succeeded in real-time 3D analysis of organellar properties of heterologous stem cells. The team used a microscopic technique called Optical Diffraction Tomography (ODT) which reproduces three-dimensional images in a holographic (3D-imaging-enabled stereoscopic picture) method using scattered light obtained by irradiating light on transparent cells and a standard light source.

 

This study is published on 'Molecules and Cells,' a renowned academic journal in the molecular cell biology field which selected a 3D image of characteristic organelles of stem cells as its cover.

Professor Young Sik Kim of the Department of Family Medicine and Professor Seo Young Kang of International Healthcare Center recently published a study showing that even without previous diagnosis of diabetes, there is a high risk of developing various metabolic diseases when fasting glucose levels is relatively high.

 

The proportion of obesity and abdominal obesity increased as fasting glucose levels increased in both men and women. Also, the higher the fasting glucose level, the worse control of blood pressure, triglycerides, and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol in both men and women.

 

The research was published in the online edition of ‘Journal of Diabetes,’ a renowned journal in the field of diabetes research.

Recently, a research team led by Professor Hong-Kyu Kim and Professor Min Jung Lee at the Department of Health Medicines released study results showing that women with superior quality muscle, i.e., normal attenuation muscle, have up to 66% less risk of coronary artery calcification compared to those without.

 

The research results are published in 'Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology,' an official academic journal of the American Heart Association.

Cochlear implant is widely accepted means of auditory rehabilitation for patients with severe hearing loss.

 

There are many patients who hesitate to undergo surgery due to anxiety because cochlear implant results may vary depending on the cochlear nerve condition. According to a study by Professor Hong Ju Park of the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, favorable outcomes can be predicted with a presence of cochlear nerve at a high-frequency region.

 

It was confirmed that cochlear nerve diameter was thinner in patients with longer hearing loss periods. Patients with thin cochlear nerve due to long-term hearing loss also had cochlear implant performance. It was analyzed that the presence of cochlear nerve at a high-frequency region also has a great influence on the outcome of surgery. Patients with a well-maintained spiral shape in the tail of cochlear nerve had about 28% higher improvement in speech performance through cochlear implant than patients who did not.

 

The study was published in ‘Otology & Neurotology,’ the official publication of the American Otological Society.

Dyslipidemia is a condition in which either an increase of total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol and neutral fat or a decrease of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol is found in hematologic tests. A recent study conducted by a research team led by Professor Young-Sik Kim at the Department of Family Medicine and Professor Seo-Young Kang of the International Healthcare Center on patients taking a lipid-lowering drug (Pravastatin) to control dyslipidemia revealed that eating habits such as regular eating, intake frequency of food with high cholesterol content have a direct influence on the control of cholesterol and neutral fat.

 

The study’s findings are published in an online version of 'Nutrients,' an international academic journal on nutritional science.

AMC recently achieved 7,000 cases of cleft lip and palate surgery since it started treatment in 1989. It has also been at the forefront of cleft lip and palate reconstruction surgery in Korea, performing more than 300 cases a year from 2010.

 

The cleft lip and palate plastic surgery team are comprised of Professors Kyung Suk Koh, Jong Woo Choi, Tae Suk Oh and Woo Shik Jeong from the Department of Plastic Surgery. The team’s achievements include 1,900 cases of cheilorrhaphy (cheilostomatoplasty), 1,800 cases of palatine suture (palatorrhaphy), 800 cases of gum (alveolar) bone graft,1,900 cases of primary correction of the nasal deformity (primary rhinoplasty) and 500 cases of dyslalia (palatopharyngeal incompetence) correction.

The 33rd Asan Award Ceremony was held at the Asan Hall on November 25th.

 

The Asan Award was established in 1989, honoring the mind of Ju-yung Chung, the founder of Asan Foundation, to encourage individuals or groups who are devoted to helping neighbors in need or practice filial piety.

 

▲ The Asan Award, the grand prix was presented to Dr. Woo Jung Kim, the Executive Director of Hebron Medical Center. He founded a hospital for low-income residents in Cambodia in 2007 and contributed to treating diseases of local residents and developing a medical workforce for 15 years. All his efforts are oriented towards improving Cambodia’s weak medical infrastructure.

 

▲ The Medical Service Award was presented to Dr. Young-ah Choi of Seoul Seobuk Hospital who has strived for 20 years to improve the quality of life of the homeless through housing and rehabilitation supports and tried to offer disease treatment to the homeless who have been excluded from medical benefits.

 

▲ The Social Service Award was presented to Mr. Soon-Young Gwon, the Representative of Nutrition & Education International (NEI) who has been devoted for the last 18 years to bean cultivation and processing industry development for Afghanistan people who are suffering from war and starvation.

 

Awards were also given for three other categories of Welfare Practice Award, Volunteer Award and Filial Piety & Family Award to 15 awardees (including groups).

AMC team led by Professor Jeong In-gap of the Department of Urology conducted a study on 364 patients with prostate cancer who underwent radical prostate resection from October 2012 to January 2019. 183 people were asked to take 20 mg of statin-based atorvastatin and 181 others with a placebo daily for a year, followed up with cancer recurrence.

 

The research team determined the recurrence of prostate cancer by testing blood prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels. As a result of examining patients' blood prostate-specific antigen levels every three months for one year after surgery, 30 (16.4%) out of 183 patients taking low-dose atorvastatin and 29 (16.0%) out of 181 patients taking placebo had biochemical recurrences. As a result of follow-up for up to five years, 37.7% (69) of patients taking low-dose atorvastatin and 35.4% (64) of patients taking placebo showed little difference between the two groups.

 

The results of this study were published in ‘Clinical Cancer Research,’ an authoritative international journal published by the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR).

AMC Pediatric Liver Transplantation Team performed an analysis on 287 cases of living donor liver transplantation in pediatric patients since 1994, to study the survival rate by period. The results reported that the survival rate of living donor liver transplantation in pediatric patients in the last decade was found to be 99%. The known 10-year cumulative survival rate of living donor liver transplantation in pediatric patients in Korea is approximately 85%.

 

The research findings are published in the 'Journal of Liver Transplantation,' a renowned international academic journal in the field of liver transplantation.

Biliary tract cancer is often inoperable when discovered and extremely difficult to treat, with a one-year survival rate of 40% after anti-cancer drug treatment. Recently, research results released by AMC team led by Professor Chang-hoon Yoo at the Department of Oncology are acknowledged worldwide and shaping the international standards of anti-cancer drug treatment for biliary tract cancer.

 

The team added an anti-cancer drug called liposome irinotecan as a comedication to the existing secondary treatment for the biliary tract of cancer patients whose cancer progressed after the first treatment. It was reported that the patients’ progression-free survival (PFS) was extended significantly by half a year. The existing second treatment involved sole administration of fluorouracil, which was used for other gastrointestinal cancers.

 

The results of this prospective study were published in the 'Lancet Oncology' (IF = 41.316).

Asan Medical Center, selected as the preferred bidder for the Cheongna Medical Complex Town in July, has begun preparing the construction of AMC Cheongna. AMC Cheongna Development has been recently organized with Professor Kee-joon Choi (Cardiology) as the Head and Professors Kyung-rim Sung (Ophthalmology) and Hyeong-ryul Kim (Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery) as Vice Heads.

 

AMC Cheongna has been allocated 105,954㎡ of the entire project site and plans to begin construction in 2023, complete building in 2026, and officially open in 2027. After the hospital's official opening, an educational research center, a new wing (with 300-500 beds), and an advanced medical center will be added to it. The 800-bed AMC Cheongna will be established to deliver the following goals: to become a global medical hub by building world-class specialist centers; to specialize in treating high-difficulty patients with severe symptoms; to construct an elderly-friendly medical environment, and to apply a new paradigm towards a futuristic and intelligent hospital.

According to a recently published research report, reducing the size of a tumor using preoperative neoadjuvant chemotherapy for cancer patients in late stages was found to be more effective.

 

AMC Stomach Cancer Team conducted a study on 530 advanced stomach cancer patients, who participated in phase 3 clinical trials in 18 hospitals since 2012. Doctors who participated in this study include Professors Yoon-koo Kang, Min-hee Ryu, and Baek-Yeol Ryoo from the Division of Oncology; Professors Jeong-hwan Yook, Moon-won Yoo, and Professor Beom-su Kim from the Division of Stomach Surgery; Professor Young-soo Park from Department of Pathology; and Professor Jong Seok Lee from the Department of Radiology.

 

The research findings are published in the 'Journal of Clinical Oncology,' an international academic journal of the globally well-known American Society of Clinical Oncology.

AMC team of the Division of Gastroenterology led by professors Dong-wan Seo and Tae-jun Song proposed WISE (WEO International School of EUS) to WEO (World Endoscopy Organization) in 2018 to pass on the hospital’s advanced procedure knowledge and experience to doctors around the world.

 

This is a one-year program where a trainee can achieve systematic learning of EUS in general. Training applications are coming from across the continents, including Asia, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and South America. The faculty is comprised of internationally renowned EUS specialists.

 

In 2018 and 2019, when the program was held onsite at AMC, six doctors and nine doctors were trained in AMC, respectively.  However, the training format changed to online because COVID-19 and 30 doctors were selected for the 2020 program. This year, 42 doctors joined the program

AMC team led by Professor Kim Hun Sik of the Department of Biomedical Sciences produced bispecific antibodies on various platforms and derived bispecific antibody active substances optimized for activation of natural killer (NK) cells to confirm the possibility of early diagnosis and prognosis in multiple myeloma samples.

 

The team classified samples of patients with multiple myeloma and immunodeficiency disease, reflective lymphatic proliferation syndrome, directly measured the activity of NK cells in the blood, and confirmed the possibility of diagnosis through clinical prognosis and relationship analysis.

 

The results of this study were published in the international journal ‘ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.’

Asan Medical Center recognized as the world’s best hospitals at the World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2022 by Newsweek, the US-based news magazine. AMC’s detailed rankings are as follows: 5th in oncology; 5th in endocrinology; 8th in gastroenterology; 8th in neurology; 12th in orthopedics; 27th in pulmonology; 35th in cardiology; 52nd in cardiac surgery; and rank 70th in pediatrics.

 

Among the eight categories in which AMC was ranked high globally, it achieved first among local hospitals in seven departments: oncology, endocrinology, gastroenterology, neurology, pulmonology, cardiology, and cardiac surgery. Earlier this year, AMC was ranked 34th among international hospitals at the World’s Best Hospitals 2021, announced by Newsweek. It defended first place among the local hospitals three years in a row. AMC was also highly recognized in the recently released rankings of the World’s Best Specialized Hospitals, building upon its reputation as the best hospital in Korea.

AMC team led by Professor Jun Young Chang of the Department of Neurology recently announced that a study of patients who underwent thrombectomy for stroke showed that poor glucose control increases the risk of bleeding complications and recurrence of stroke.

 

The team conducted a study on the relationship between glucose control level and neurological function recovery in patients with a domestic stroke multi-organ cohort (CRCS-K) from January 2019 to March 2020. As a result, when glycated hemoglobin was adjusted to less than 7 percent, it was confirmed that it helped restore neurological function after thrombectomy. On the other hand, if the glycated hemoglobin level exceeds 7% due to poor glucose control, the risk of cerebral infarction increased and bleeding increased after thrombectomy, indicating that neurological function recovery dropped by 47%. This relevance was significant regardless of the patient's age, gender, type of cerebral infarction, and degree of vascular reopening.

 

The results of the study were published in ‘Diabetes Care.’

After six years of marriage, the couple was expecting their first child. They were eagerly counting the days to the delivery, and everything was going fine until, during the 17th-week pregnancy checkup, they were told about the baby’s condition. There was severe intrauterine growth retardation, which meant that the baby had poor growth and there was little chance of survival. In late March, as a last resort, the couple rushed to AMC, where they met Professor Jin Hoon Jung.

 

The fetus, Professor Jung realized, was five weeks smaller than it should have been considering the pregnancy week. Professor Jung decided to extend the mother’s hospitalization by a few weeks so that the fetus could stay in the womb as long as possible. Despite these efforts, the fetal heart rate continued to dip, and on April 4, an emergency cesarean section had to be performed.
In 24 weeks and six days, five weeks earlier than expected, Geon-woo came into the world. But he could not breathe spontaneously, as the fetal alveoli were not yet fully formed. Pulmonary surfactant was immediately administered by intratracheal instillation, and then, to everyone’s joy, Geon-woo’s heart started to beat.

 

As Geon-woo’s doctor, Professor Ellen Ai-Rhan Kim at the Department of Neonatology was determined not just to save his life but also to ‘keep him well.’ The Neonatal Team worked hard to this end, with residents, fellows, and nurses attending to Geon-woo throughout the day, with pharmacists preparing customized IV injections to prevent bone , with nurses sterilizing breast milk every time to ensure safe feeding—everyone worked with one goal and one mind.

 

Eight days after his birth, Geon-woo no longer needed his respirator, and his body weight was recorded at over 1kg. And in the middle of the 4th month after the delivery, at almost five months old, he was out of the incubator, his weight recording over 2 kg.

 

Geon-woo, whose birth weight was 288 grams, is the smallest baby in Korea among the reported survival cases of extremely premature babies. Geon-woo will be registered as the 32nd smallest baby in the world.

AMC Postpartum Hemorrhage Alert Team (PAT) of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology (comprising Professors Hye-sung Won, Professor Jin Hoon Chung, Professor Mi-young Lee, and Professor So-yeon Kim) had studied uterine artery embolization performed on pregnant women at high risk due to placenta previa from 2011 to 2020. They announced that the success rate of the procedure was approximately 95%. Uterine artery embolization is performed by inserting a small catheter through the femoral artery via the groin to access the uterine artery, the blood supplier to the uterus. A hemostatic formulation is then directly injected to block the vessel. This procedure is known to have few complications.

A research team led by Professor Kyung-rim Sung and Professor Joon Won Shin at the Department of Ophthalmology has succeeded in using artificial neural network technology to develop an artificial intelligence (AI) model, which has memorized 96,000 eyesight test results. The team revealed that the AI model had successfully screened approximately 86% of patients with high-risk glaucoma that could lead to vision loss.

 

The findings of the study have been published in the prestigious 'American Journal of Ophthalmology.'

AMC research team led by Professor Seung-whan Lee and Professor Pil-hyung Lee at the Division of Cardiology has recently released research results, on the correlation between pre-hypertension and coronary sclerosis.

 

The research team studied 4,666 subjects who had received coronary CT angiography from 2007 to 2011 at the Health Promotion Center, and had no history of heart disease or anti-hypertensive intake. The subjects were categorized into four groups according to the U.S. hypertension guideline: Normal group (120/80㎜Hg); Pre-hypertension group (120-129/80㎜Hg); Stage 1 hypertension group (130-139/80-89㎜Hg); and, Stage 2 hypertension group (140/90㎜Hg). The analysis of these four groups revealed that the prevalence of coronary sclerosis was 1.12 times higher in the pre-hypertension group, 1.37 times higher in the stage 1 hypertension group, and 1.66 times higher in the stage 2 hypertension group, in comparison with the normal blood pressure group.

 

The findings of the study have been published in the 'American Journal of Hypertension,' an international academic journal.

The 10th AP VALVES & STRUCTURAL HEART 2021 Virtual was held online from August 5 to 6, 2021, to celebrate its 10th year since its inception in 2012.

 

Invited speakers included top global experts in the cardiovascular system, heart structure, and disease, including Eberhard Grube, MD of University Hospital, Bonn, Alan C. Yeung, MD of Stanford University School of Medicine, Lars Sondergaard, MD of Rigshospitalet. Denmark, Jian (James) Ye, MD of St. Paul's Hospital, Canada, and Philippe Garot, MD of Institut Jacques Cartier, France. The conference was attended by 1,210 cardiology experts from 50 countries, who shared their updated knowledge on advanced procedures related to heart valve diseases.

 

The conference featured lectures and live cases and participants engaged thoroughly in the sessions that introduced clinical cases and procedures employing the latest equipment in the field.

AMC team led by Professor Hong-Kyu Kim at the Department of Health Medicine confirmed that there was no significant difference in the total muscle mass between healthy people without metabolic diseases such as high blood pressure or diabetes, but there were more high-quality muscles in metabolically healthy people. This proves that the more quality muscles there are, the higher the probability of metabolic health.

 

The results of this study were published in ‘Obesity,’ the official international journal of The Obesity Society (TOS).

A study has been published that even if there is a risk of lymph node metastasis during early colorectal cancer, it can be safely treated by endoscopy instead of surgery.

 

AMC team led by Professor Jeong-Sik Byeon and Professor Dong-Hoon Yang of the Division of Gastroenterology analyzed the disease-free survival rate and cancer mortality rate of 464 patients who had endoscopic resection and 388 patients who had surgical resection among patients diagnosed with early colorectal cancer with a possibility of lymph node metastasis from January 2011 to December 2016. As a result, the 3-year disease-free survival rates were 98.9% and 97.6% and the 5-year disease-free survival rates were 98.5% and 97% for patients who first had endoscopy and patients who had surgery, respectively.

 

The results of this study were published in ‘Gastrointestinal Endoscopy,’ the most prominent international journal in the field of gastrointestinal endoscopy.

The Asan Medical Center consortium was officially selected as the preferred bidder for Cheongna Medical Complex Town on July 28. Earlier, the Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority said that the AMC consortium received the highest score from the ‘Cheongna Medical Complex Town Project Proposal Evaluation Committee’ among the five consortiums. AMC, selected as the preferred bidder, will sign an agreement around the end of this year after a maximum 150 days of negotiation.

The Cheongna Medical Complex Town is a large-scale project with an area coverage of 260,000㎡ in Cheongna International City, which is twice the current AMC hospital site. The project involves building a general hospital with more than 800 beds, medical and bio-related industrial facilities, research institutes, business facilities, and sales facilities.

AMC has recently concluded an agreement of joint operation with Scope Investment, a UAE private investment group, to open the UAE-Asan Gastroenterology Hospital (tentative) in Dubai.

 

The UAE-Asan Gastroenterology Hospital will be the first global hospital for AMC outside of South Korea and the first comprehensive gastroenterology hospital in 6 Middle East countries including UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, etc. The hospital plans to provide diagnostic services and surgical treatments for both adults and children through treatments including bariatric/metabolic surgeries, pre and post-operative organ transplant management, and gastrointestinal disease, in addition to cancer therapies with advanced endoscopic procedures such as EMR, ESE, ERCP.

 

The digestive disease is the most frequently occurring disease in the UAE, with a prevalence as high as 2 out of 10. The rate of adult obesity in the UAE is almost 27.8%, and obesity is considered a major enemy that is to be defeated. AMC was ranked the 6th best hospital for gastroenterology in the World’s Best Hospitals by Newsweek last year. As a result, people in the Middle East have high expectations from its roles in improving local medical service standards and cultivating medical professionals.

The research team of AMC Children’s Hospital, with Professor Ho-joon Im, Professor Kyung-Nam koh, and Professor Hye-ry Kim of the Division of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology and Professor Dae-yeon Kim and Professor Jung-Man Namkoong of the Division of Pediatric Surgery, improved the survival rate of patients with childhood hepatoblastoma to over 90% through chemotherapy segmentation and the adoption of fluorescent imaging during surgery.

The team administered aggressive chemotherapy to patients with multiple tumors or metastasis so that surgery could be conducted. Less aggressive chemotherapy was administered to other patients to reduce the side effects.

The study’s findings were published in ‘Cancer Medicine,’ an international academic journal.

The Asan Foundation held a symposium under the theme of “Changes in the Social Structure in the Digital Age and Policy Response.” At the symposium, researchers gave presentations on three topics followed by discussions among experts. 

 

The symposium kicked off with the topic, “Legal Issues and Challenges in Digital Healthcare,” in the first part. The second topic was “Cases of Public Conflict in Korean Society: A Study of Utilization of Mediation, Participatory Conflict Management, and Preventive Approaches and Overseas Systems,” and the third topic was “The Paradigm of Social Welfare in the Digital Age: Network Approach,” where the social welfare paradigm in the digital age was presented based on the changes in the social structure driven by innovations in digital technology. 

 

The symposium came to a close following a panel discussion, where the participants shared their opinions regarding the changes in the social structure in the digital age and discussed the future direction for our society.

Asan Medical Center (AMC) achieved a record of handling 100,000 cases of Transcatheter Arterial Chemoembolization (TACE) on June 14, 2021. This record marks an achievement brought about by AMC's persistent performance of handling at least 20 TACE cases a day since its inception in September 1989.

 

TACE is a therapeutic method most widely used to treat liver cancer. In this procedure, chemotherapeutic agents are delivered to the hepatic artery, which supplies oxygen and nutrition required for tumor cells to grow in the liver and embolic materials used to block the blood supply. While a normal liver tissue would receive 75% of blood from the hepatic portal and 25% from the hepatic artery, a liver cancer tissue receives more than 90% of blood from the hepatic artery. Therefore, if the hepatic artery can be singled out to administer chemotherapeutic agents and block the blood supply, damage to the normal liver tissue will be minimized, and the tumor can selectively be necrotized. TACE can be performed regardless of tumor size, quantity, and advancement and is beneficial to patients since a short period of hospitalization facilitates their return to daily life.

 

Handling 100,000 cases of TACE is a record that is tough to break for any institute worldwide; this means AMC has now reached a world-class level in the field of liver cancer treatment techniques. Nowadays, various treatment methods are actively employed to reduce complications and increase treatment effects simultaneously, including radioembolization, which involves the infusion of radioactive microspheres to necrotize the tumor.

It was demonstrated that severe-case patients and international scholars from abroad visited AMC for treatment and training even during the COVID-19 pandemic, despite the inconvenience of long self-quarantine period and a series of COVID-19 tests as well as the risk of possible COVID-19 infection during traveling.

Approximately 12,000 (man-days) foreign patients were treated in AMC last year. By nationality, 3,527 patients from the U.S. accounted for the highest proportion (30%), followed by 1,314 patients (11%) from the UAE, 1,145 patients (10%) from China, 1,054 patients (9%) from Mongolia, 968 patients (8%) from Saudi Arabia, and 624 patients (5%) from Kazakhstan. In the early days of COVID-19, although the number of foreign patients decreased, the number has been recovering since last winter and is back to almost the pre-COVID-19 level. In fact, the recovery trend is more remarkable this year, and the monthly average of foreign patients exceeded 1,000 from January to May, which is a 20% increase compared to last year’s monthly average.

 

In this global pandemic, deciding to travel abroad may not be easy for severe-case patients abroad who have run out of treatment options in their own country. Before they can come to the hospital, they have to spend 2 weeks of self-quarantine while suffering from their medical conditions, and their COVID-19 test results must be negative. AMC was well received for successful hospital disinfection and infection control of transplant candidates, as 130 cases (from January to March 2020) of living donor liver transplantation were carried out without any problem even when the U.S. United Network for Organ Sharing temporarily stopped kidney and pancreas transplantation due to COVID-19 infection issues.

 

Further, continuous visits have also been made by international scholars from abroad. Since the middle of last year, AMC has temporarily suspended the training program considering medical staffing shortage and hospital disinfection concerns triggered by medical system breakdown in many countries. Even so, some 100 international scholars, including the existing long-term trainees and medical teams from the Middle East, whose visits were agreed upon by the two concerned nations, safely participated in the training during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some 10 years before COVID-19, over 3,600 medical scientists from around 90 countries, including the U.S., China, Mongolia, and Saudi Arabia, visited AMC to learn its latest medical technologies, advanced research, and efficient medical service management systems and went back to their own countries. Moreover, although onsite training has been inevitably restricted this year, AMC is actively engaged in providing training sessions using an online platform, once again turning a risk into an opportunity.

 

Thus, AMC provides information via an online channel for patients, their guardians, and the general public who cannot visit the hospital in person. As a matter of fact, the proportion of viewers from abroad has greatly increased for videos uploaded on YouTube. Foreign viewers accounted for 11.7% of the total viewers in 2019 and increased more than twofold to 31% in 2020. The number of viewers from the U.S. was 294,742 in 2019, which more than doubled to 656,466 in 2020. Further, viewers from Japan recorded a five-fold increase from 37,057 to 188,229. In addition, to facilitate accurate medical information to patients abroad, AMC provides subtitles in English, Chinese, Russian, Arabic, and Mongolian in its YouTube videos, which introduce various diseases and patient cases.

A research team led by Professor Kyoung Won Kim and Jeong Hyun Lee, a researcher, recently developed a clinical trial imaging management system complying with CDISC (Clinical Data Interchange Standardization Consortium) standards. CDISC is a recent international data standard required in many countries, including the U.S., Europe, Japan, and China. The AMC Clinical Trial Center is a member of CDISC, Korea.

 

The clinical trial imaging management system applies to CDISC’s clinical data collection standards and standard terminology throughout the entire process, from data collection to extraction for standardized electronic case reports.

 

Once entered into the system, the data first passes through an automated verification process. The error rate such as data omission is minimized while data accuracy and consistency are maintained. Applying this system to actual clinical trial imaging data management demonstrated drastically decreased data input and format errors from 176 cases to 0.

 

Patent applications for this technology were filed domestically and internationally and have now been transferred to Trial Informatics, a clinical trial digital data-based solution provider.

 

The research results were verbally presented at the 2020 CDISC Japan Interchange and recently published in the latest volume of the Journal of Biomedical Informatics.

Recently, more and more patients are being diagnosed with endometrial cancer at young ages, and the number of patients opting for drug treatment instead of hysterectomy is increasing. Progestin-based drugs are mainly used to control progesterone; however, prolonged treatment over 1 year is dangerous.

 

A research team led by Professor Dae-yeon Kim and Professor Shin-wha Lee of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology published their findings that long-term drug treatment of endometrial cancer patients preserves fertility for safe pregnancy and is also effective for cancer treatment.

 

The research team studied 51 patients with early-stage endometrial cancer who had the persistent disease after receiving the uterus-preserving treatment with progestin-based drugs for one year. The team conducted an additional drug treatment on these patients for an average period of 5 months. As a result, it was confirmed that cancer was cured in over 70% of them to the extent that they could get pregnant. After the additional drug treatment, 37 out of 51 patients achieved complete remission while 13 achieved partial remission. Although one patient had disease progression during the treatment, hysterectomy was performed safely on her as the progression was detected during a regular examination.

 

The total drug treatment period was approximately 17 months on average. Among the patients who achieved complete remission, the longest drug treatment period was approximately 92 months. Among 23 patients who achieved complete remission and tried to get pregnant, nine were successful. Cancer relapsed in 12 patients out of 37 who achieved complete remission; however, eight of these 12 achieved complete remission once again from further prolonged drug treatment.

 

The research findings were published recently in Gynecologic Oncology, a globally renowned academic journal in the field of gynecologic cancer.

Professor Jong Woo Choi of the Department of Plastic Surgery and Professor Namkug Kim of the Department of Convergence Medicine teamed up to develop a patient-customized 3D skin cancer surgical guide that maps the lesion of a skin cancer patient in a three-dimensional view.

 

When a 3D skin cancer surgical guide covers the anesthetized patient’s face on the day of surgery, it is exactly fitted to the patient’s nose and ear shapes to delineate the tumor lesion inside the skin in a three-dimensional view. The operating surgeon can follow the guide, mark multiple resection sites, and precisely excise the cancerous lesion. While the current practice has been to rely on the operating surgeon’s experience in determining the scope of resection, this guide is expected to facilitate a surgery plan customized to individual patients for more accurate, safer operations.

 

The research team used the CT and MRI imaging information of a skin cancer patient for 3D modeling of the skin and lesion. Later, the lesion shape was projected vertically to the surface to accurately predict the resection's scope, and the resulting resection guide was 3D printed. As the research team created a sophisticated body phantom and measured the quantified accuracy of the guide, the results confirmed that the scope of the resection could be determined accurately because the lesion’s depth in addition to width and length can be calculated if the area invaded by the lesion is confirmed via CT and MRI imaging. However, the guide has limited applications in small skin cancers unidentifiable on the image.

 

The research was published in the latest volume of Scientific Reports, an SCI-level international academic journal.

The Asan Medical Center has recently signed an agreement with Scope Investment, a private investment group in UAE, to open the UAE-Asan Gastroenterology Hospital (tentative name) in Dubai.

 

The UAE-Asan Gastroenterology Hospital will be AMC’s first overseas hospital and the first gastroenterology hospital in six countries in the Middle East, including the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. It will offer treatment for digestive diseases and disorders and gastrointestinal cancer based on advanced endoscopic procedures, such as endoscopic mucosal resection (EMR), endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD), and endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP), in addition to surgery for obesity and pre- and post-operative care for organ transplant patients. Diagnosis, surgery, and treatment will be offered to both children and adults.

 

Digestive diseases are common medical conditions in the UAE, affecting two out of every ten individuals, and with an obesity rate of 27.8%, obesity has become a major health issue. AMC, which was ranked the world’s 6th best hospital for gastroenterology by Newsweek last year, is expected to help raise the treatment standards and foster competent medical specialists in Dubai.

Critical patients and medical scientists from overseas came to the Asan Medical Center, despite the current travel risks due to the COVID-19 and the inconveniences associated with multiple testing and quarantine, in order to receive high-quality treatment or training.

 

Last year, around 12,000 foreigners received treatment at AMC. By nationality, the largest number came from the United States at 3,527 (30%), followed by the United Arab Emirates (1,314 patients, 11%), China (1,145 patients, 10%), Mongolia (1,045 patients, 9%), Saudi Arabia (968 patients, 8%), and Kazakhstan (24 patients, 5%). While the number of foreign patients declined in the early stages of the pandemic, it began recovering to pre-pandemic levels last winter. The rebound was even more pronounced this year, with more than 1,000 foreigners coming to AMC each month from January to May, on average.

 

It was probably not an easy decision for critical patients that the doctors at home had given up on to travel abroad to seek medical treatment in the midst of a pandemic, having to self-isolate for two weeks after arriving in Korea and waiting for their COVID-19 test to come back negative. In contrast to the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) of the United States, which had to temporarily suspend all kidney and pancreas transplantations due to COVID-19, AMC successfully carried out 130 living-donor liver transplants from January to March 2020 and gained recognition for its effective measures in infectious disease control and prevention.

 

AMC has also been welcoming foreign medical scientists. AMC was forced to temporarily suspend its training program in the middle of last year due to shortages of medical professionals and infectious disease control measures. Training was still provided to around 100 foreign medical scientists, including those from the Middle East whose countries had signed an agreement with AMC and other long-term trainees. For a decade prior to the global health crisis, more than 3,600 medical scientists from around 90 countries, including the United States, China, Mongolia, and Saudi Arabia, came to AMC to learn about its latest health technologies and the advanced research and healthcare management system, but unfortunately, the program had to be shut down.

 

AMC has online channels to communicate with and provide useful information to the general public, including patients and their caregivers, abroad. Foreigners accounted for 11.7% of all viewers of AMC’s YouTube videos in 2019, but it nearly tripled to 31% in 2020. The number of viewers from the United States doubled from 294,742 in 2019 to 656,466 in 2020, and it jumped five-fold in Japan from 37,057 to 188,229. AMC is offering subtitles in English, Chinese, Russian, Arabic, and Mongolian on its YouTube videos featuring various cases of diseases and patients to provide accurate medical information to the world.

At the Hybrid Operation Room at the Asan Medical Center Heart Institute on May 6, a procedure was performed on a 90-year-old female patient suffering from severe aortic stenosis to replace her damaged aortic valve with an artificial valve. This was the first 1,000th TAVI case in Asia.

 

According to an analysis of 1,000 TAVI cases so far, the average patient age was 80, and most were high-risk patients with diabetes (32.8%), hypertension (12.2%), and cerebral apoplexy (12.2%). In contrast, 21.6% had severe diseases, including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Although TAVI was mainly performed on high-risk patients over 80 years old, the real success rate is recorded at 95% to date and 99% in the recent five years.

 

Aortic stenosis involves calcification and narrowing of the old aortic valve, which develops blood flow dysfunction. In the past, it was mainly treated by surgically opening a patient’s chest. Recently, however, TAVI without general anesthesia is performed for patients who cannot undergo surgeries or are aged.

 

The TAVI procedure is as follows: A balloon is guided along the artery to the heart valve and inflated between the narrowed valve. Then, a mesh-type artificial valve stent is inserted to replace the existing valve. This procedure reduces the patients’ burden of undergoing surgery because recovery is exceptionally faster than general anesthesia. Another advantage is that patients can return to their everyday life early because they can be discharged from hospitalization three days after the procedure.

 

The success rate of 1,000 TAVI cases performed at the Heart Institute of Asan Medical Center is 96%. The rate further increased to 99% in the past five years. An extremely low complication incidence was demonstrated with 1% severe stroke and 1% early (in 30 days) death. Such records put the Institute on par with the relevant leaders in the U.S. and Europe.

 

This 1,000th TAVI is more meaningful in that it is also the 100th TAVI this year. About 100 cases in four months are the 100 cases in the shortest period since TAVI began in 2010. The Institute expects that around 300 TAVI cases will be conducted by the end of the year.

Professor Tae-won Kim (Head of AMC Cancer Institute) and Professor Yong-sang Hong of the Division of Oncology researched the anti-cancer effects of belvarafenib, a new drug candidate. The results were published in the May issue of 'Nature', one of the top scientific journals recognized worldwide.

 

Belvarafenib inhibits overexpression of RAS and RAF, the proteins concerned with bio-signal delivery. The paper presented the medical conditions that benefit from belvarafenib and the measures to overcome resistance mechanisms and tolerance. The article received a favorable evaluation, particularly in that it demonstrated a therapeutic possibility for N-RAS-mutated malignancy, including melanoma currently with no effective treatment measure.

 

The research team administered belvarafenib, a new drug candidate developed by a domestic company, to 135 solid cancer patients with RAS and RAF mutation and confirmed that partial remission of reduced tumor size was observed from a considerable number of patients. The research targeted various cancers, including colorectal cancer, lung cancer, and pancreatic cancer, and partial remission was observed in 11% of the patients. Partial remission was observed in 44%of the melanoma patients with N-RAS mutation, which is a sort of RAS mutation, indicating that belvarafenib was effective for melanoma.

 

The research team unveiled a mechanism that generated drug resistance through a preclinical study and discovered that concomitant use with another drug (cobimetinib, the MEK inhibitor) could also resolve the belvarafenib tolerance.

 

At the moment, a phase 1 clinical trial is in progress for patients with N-RAS mutation in six countries, including Korea and the U.S. An additional test of concomitant use of the belvarafenib and MEK inhibitor is also in progress separately.

With Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) becoming a key issue in business management today, the Asan Medical Center became the first domestic general hospital to launch an ESG committee with the aim of building win-win relationships with the local community and healthcare sector and pursuing sustainable development. The committee is comprised of six internal members, including Vice President & Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Lee Je-hwan (Chairperson of the Committee), and three outside members. 

 

The ESG Committee of AMC discussed the direction of ESG management following a special lecture titled “Medical Institutions and ESG” at its first meeting.

The results of an analysis of antipsychotic drug treatments for schizophrenia patients showed that long-acting injection, a type of treatment that involves injecting medication at one- to three-month intervals, has a lower rate of treatment discontinuation than oral drug administration.

 

Professor Jung Sun Lee and Sung Woo Joo of the Department of Psychiatry used data from the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service to analyze 44,396 patients who received treatment for schizophrenia from 2009 to 2016. Patients who received antipsychotic drug treatments were divided into two groups: long-acting medication injection group and drug administration group. The treatment discontinuation rate was compared between the two groups and the long-acting medication injection group’s treatment discontinuation rate was approximately 36% lower than that of the drug administration group. When long-acting medication injection cases were compared with those who were unexposed to drugs, it was demonstrated that long-acting medication injection lowered the relapse risk by 71%, approximately.

 

The study was recently published in ‘Psychological Medicine,’ an international medical journal.

Recently, a team of researchers led by Professor Sun-ju Chung of the Department of Neurology published the finding from their study that nitrogen dioxide (NO2) is associated with Parkinson’s disease. This is the first large population-based study that demonstrates the correlation.

 

The research team studied around 79,000 adults, 40 years or older and recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, who had lived in Seoul from 2002 to 2006 and tracked their exposure to air pollution for up to 9 years. The study revealed that the risk of developing Parkinson’s disease was 41% higher in the 25% of adults most exposed to NO2 than in those in the 25% least exposed. Of the air pollutants including NO2, fine dust (including ultra-fine dust), ozone (O3), sulfur dioxide (SO2) and carbon monoxide (CO), only NO2 showed a significant association with the occurrence of Parkinson’s disease.

 

Professor Chung’s team assumed that three mechanisms linked NO2 with the increased risk of Parkinson’s disease: 1) NO2 has a toxic effect on the olfactory nerve in the nose, spreads morbid alpha-synuclein to the brain and induces extinction of various brain cells including dopaminergic neuron; 2) NO2 increases inflammatory factors, such as interleukin-1 beta, interleukin-6, interleukin-8, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, etc., which induce brain inflammation; and 3) NO2 infiltrates into the brain and induces mitochondrial malfunction.

 

These findings have been published in ‘JAMA Neurology,’ a well-known medical journal in the field of neurology and the study was selected as the article of the month. The journal also included the official online discussion between Professor Chung and the editor-in-chief of ‘JAMA Neurology,’ who expressed great interest in this study.

The 26th Cardiovascular Summit Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics Asia Pacific (TCTAP 2021 VIRTUAL) was held for four days from April 21, 2021, on an online platform.

 

Sponsored by the Asan Medical Center Heart Institute and organized by the CardioVascular Research Foundation (CVRF), TCTAP is a representative international academic symposium in the Asia-Pacific region attended by approximately 4,000 cardiology experts from around 50 countries every year since first held in 1995 at the Asan Medical Center.

 

In the face of several challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic this year, TCTAP witnessed the largest participation to date as 6,438 cardiology experts from 80 countries worldwide registered for the summit. This year’s TCTAP, held on an online platform, was particularly well-received. It was more meaningful via facilitated access to medical teams in developing countries, young healthcare professionals, medical students, etc., who previously found it difficult to attend the summit in person.

 

At the summit, the world’s renowned hospitals and great scholars in cardiology assembled and shared their opinions and insights on various themes, including the latest medication therapy for heart diseases, left main coronary disease treatment, latest valve intervention therapy, cardiovascular radiology, and vital functions, chronic obstructive lesion intervention, medication therapy for the acute coronary syndrome, etc.

The Korean Intern Resident Association announced the results of the 2020 National Residents’ Hospital Evaluation. 

 

To the question, “Would you bring your family to the medical institution where you are currently receiving training for medical care (in consideration of patient safety and quality of medical care),” 92.9% of the residents of Asan Medical Center (AMC) answered, “Yes,” which put AMC at No. 1 among six major hospitals with 500 or more residents. Coming in second place was Samsung Medical Center (88.3%), followed by Seoul National University Hospital (84.9%), Severance Hospital (77.9%), Catholic Medical Center (55.5%), and Korea University Medical Center (47.6%).

 

Meanwhile, 57.2% of the residents from fifteen mid-sized training hospitals with 200 to fewer than 499 residents and 48.5% of the residents from thirty-three small training hospitals with 100 to 199 residents answered that they would recommend their respective hospitals to a sick family member. 

 

AMC scored above average in most of the questions concerning the training environment, safety of residents, working conditions, and wages. An especially high level of satisfaction was reported for “Provision of necessary infrastructure for training and medical care.”

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is an intractable disorder characterized by chronically induced abdominal pain, diarrhea, hemafecia, etc. due to intestinal infection with unknown cause. While infliximab is most widely used for inflammatory bowel disease, it was inconvenient for patients because routine hospital visits were required for intravenous (IV) injection. Instead of IV injection, a recently developed subcutaneous injectable solution can be injected directly by the patient to subcutaneous tissues, including the abdomen, thighs, etc. The effects were also as much excellent as the existing intravenous injectable solution.

 

A research team led by Professor Byong Duk Ye in the Division of Gastroenterology studied 131 active IBD patients from 50 medical facilities worldwide, randomized them into IV infliximab injection group and subcutaneous infliximab injection group, and performed an analysis on efficacy, safety, pharmacokinetics, and immunogenicity. According to the infliximab injection protocol, the IV injection group received IV injection of infliximab on weeks 0, 2 and 6 and every 8 weeks thereafter. The subcutaneous infliximab injection group received an IV injection of infliximab on weeks 0 and 2 and a subcutaneous injection every 2 weeks from week 6.

 

When the blood drug concentration on week 22 was compared between the two treatment groups, the subcutaneous injection group was not inferior to the IV injection group. A similar trend was observed until week 30 in terms of drug efficacy, safety, and immunogenicity. On week 30, the IV injection group switched to subcutaneous injection, and it was confirmed through follow-up that drug efficacy, safety, and immunogenicity were maintained until week 54.

 

The research results are recently published in an online volume of Gastroenterology, one of the most prestigious journals in gastroenterology.

Recently, it was scientifically proven that an adequate level of stress from workouts delivers low stress to brain cells that control one’s appetite, and this stress activates mitochondria (energy production location within cells) in the brain cells to use more energy in the body, resulting in obesity suppression.

 

A research team led by Professor Min-seon Kim of the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism tested rats by applying stresses with different intensities to proopiomelanocortin (POMC) cells, one of the most important neurons for weight control, and observations were made on vital reactions. When high-intensity stress was applied, neurons were killed and the rat developed severe obesity. On the other hand, when low-intensity stress was applied, a large amount of beta-endorphin, which is a chemical beneficial to activating brain cells, was generated and the sympathetic nervous system was activated. Due to the resulting energy consumption from heat generation within fatty tissues, few rats developed obesity.

 

Based on the above findings, Professor Kim’s team had the rats exercise on treadmills for 2 weeks to determine if adequate levels of stress generated from workouts provide beneficial effects on vital functions. As a result, it was observed that the interleukin-6 hormone, which was secreted from muscular cells during workout moved to the brain and delivered low stress to POMC cells that suppress appetite. It was further confirmed that the sympathetic nervous system gets excited as beta-endorphin generation is accelerated in POMC cells and more energy is consumed from fatty tissues.

Professor Kim, Ki-Hun from the Division of Liver Transplantation and Hepatobiliary Surgery was elected to be the next Chairman of the Board at the 54^th Annual Congress of the Korean Association of Hepato-Biliary-Pancreatic Surgery. The Korean Association of Hepato-Biliary-Pancreatic Surgery is an academic association incepted in 1996 with the aim of promoting education and research in the area of hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery. Dr. Kim will serve as the chairman from 2023 until 2025.

Tremor, rigidity, bradykinesia and gait disturbance are some of the Parkinson’s motion symptoms that are clearly visible body symptoms. Objective evaluation and diagnosis through a healthcare specialist’s neurological examination determine the severity of Parkinson’s symptoms. However, subjective rating errors may occur in the course.

 

Professor Sun-ju Chung of the Department of Neurology and June Goo Lee, an Associate Professor of the Department of Convergence Medicine, developed an objective and consistent rating system for evaluating and diagnosing Parkinson’s disease. The team developed an AI software that can quickly but accurately evaluate the severity of a patient’s Parkinson’s disease by analyzing the patient’s motions from a short video footage around 30 seconds long. By using this software, it is anticipated that complicated and individualized Parkinson’s motion symptoms can be diagnosed for accurate severity evaluation.

 

This AI software estimated the severity of tremor and rigidity, two of the major Parkinson’s symptoms, with 93% and 79% accuracy, respectively. In particular, the high reproducibility of measurements observed with the AI software shows a possibility to overcome the subjectivity of clinical measurements taken by different people in real clinical practice. If this AI software is expanded to user-friendly interfaces such as smartphone applications, patients are expected to be able to check the severity of their own symptoms frequently, and this will be of great assistance to raising the quality of Parkinson’s treatment. Chung and Lee revealed that they plan to get working on developing new-generation diagnostics through joint research between the Department of Neurology and the Department of Convergence Medicine in the future. NHIS Research-driven Hospital Development R&D Project supported the study, and the results were published in the latest Neurology volume, a well-known neuroscience journal.

Professor Young-sik Kim of the Department of Family Medicine and Seo-young Kang, a Clinical Instructor at the International Healthcare Center, teamed up and analyzed the correlation between Body Mass Index (BMI) and Alzheimer’s disease for adults aged 60-79 who do not have Alzheimer’s disease. They revealed that women with greater weight reduction were found to have a higher risk of Alzheimer’s, according to the analysis. While many studies have been carried out on the association of BMI with Alzheimer’s disease so far, not enough studies were conducted for the domestic population to investigate the risk of Alzheimer’s depending on the magnitude of BMI change.

 

The research team conducted a cohort study for 45,076 adults aged 60-79 who received NHIS medical examination in 2002-2003 and did not have Alzheimer’s disease. Their BMIs were compared in a 2-year term (2004-2005) and 4-year term (2006-2007), respectively, to analyze how the level of BMI change impacts Alzheimer’s disease.

 

The findings are explained here by gender as follows. The risk of Alzheimer’s disease increased in women’s 2-year comparison by 1.14 times for 5-10% decreased BMI; by 1.44 times for 10.1-15% decreased BMI, and by 1.51 times for over 15% decreased BMI. The risk of Alzheimer’s disease increased in women’s 4-year comparison by 1.31 times for 5-10% decreased BMI; by 1.6 times for 10.1-15% decreased BMI, and by 1.68 times for over 15% BMI. No significant influence was observed in men’s 2-year comparison while the risk of Alzheimer’s disease increased by 1.33 times for 10.1-15% decreased BMI in men’s 4-year comparison. The study results were recently published in the Scientific Reports of Nature, an internationally renowned scientific journal.

Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) is a type of rehabilitation therapy that helps patients who have difficulty breathing due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, interstitial lung disease, pulmonary fibrosis, and lung cancer.

 

Although patients with lung cancer and esophageal cancer need PR, many tend to refrain from it when their physical strength is lowered during radiotherapy. Dr. Sei Won Lee in the Division of Pulmonology and Critical Care Medicine and his team compared patients who received with those who did not receive PR during chest radiotherapy. It was discovered that the pulmonary function of patients who received PR increased by 6.5%, whereas little change was observed in their counterparts.

 

Between January 2018 and June 2019, the research team analyzed lung capacity change of patients with lung cancer and esophageal cancer who received PR simultaneously with radiotherapy (11 patients) and the control group (33 patients). In particular, the team organized a ‘Home PR’ program for those who found it difficult to make hospital visits and created a PR teaching material so that patients can record their physical activity level and frequency by themselves to be later discussed during their medical visits.

 

As a result, patients with lung cancer and esophageal cancer who received PR during radiotherapy showed an overall increase in lung capacity, as both FEV1 (the maximum volume of air that can be blown out in the first 1 second) and FVC (the total amount of air that can fully be exhaled) increased. The degree of bronchial obstruction also increased by 6.5%, from 48% to 54.5%, indicating significantly increased breathing capacity. On the other hand, patients who did not receive PR showed no change in FEV1, while FVC was reduced. The degree of bronchial obstruction also showed little change, from 52% to 53.8%. In the ‘6-Minute Walk Distance’ test, which measured the distance that patients could walk within a 6-minute time limit, the distance increased significantly again in patients who received PR, from 420 meters to 478 meters.

The Orthopedic Surgery Team led by Prof. Jae kwang Kim proposed a new guideline specifying that different surgical approaches should be adopted depending on hypoplasia of the extra digit, the smaller and less functional finger of a thumb polydactyly patient.

 

Thumb polydactyly has so far been categorized using the Wassel-Flatt classification system; however, the extra digit’s bone formation has not been differentiated, and no clear surgery guidelines have been in place. Because the surgical method is selected solely based on the operating doctor’s experience, some patients who could be treated with a simple operation would end up going through a complicated procedure.

 

Prof. Kim’s team categorized 200 thumb polydactyly patients who received operation at AMC between June 2016 and June 2018, using the Wassel-Flatt system. The team then classified 76 cases as ‘hypoplastic polydactyly’ where the bone formation of the extra digit was incomplete.

 

A simple resection can be adopted to treat hypoplastic polydactyly because in these cases only flesh tissue is attached to the incompletely formed bone. It will be a one-day surgery, and patients can return to daily life in just 2 weeks. However, cases other than hypoplastic polydactyly may require bone resection or joint reconstruction because the extra digit is attached to a normal finger, bone or joint. Also, in 30–40% of the patients, additional operations such as osteotomy or pin fixation are needed for deformity correction.

 

The research results were recently published in the Journal of Hand Surgery (European Volume), an international publication on hand surgery and microsurgery.

Asan Medical Center (AMC) was ranked first among Korean hospitals and 34th among international hospitals at the World’s Best Hospitals 2021 by Newsweek, a U.S.-based news magazine. AMC moved up three notches from last year’s 37th place in the global ranking and defended its top position among local hospitals.

 

Newsweek has partnered with Statista Inc., the global market research and consumer data firm, to rank the world’s best hospitals among a selection of 200 hospitals by putting together recommendations from 70,000 medical experts across 25 countries, patient satisfaction data, and other sources. The results for 2021 were released on the official Newsweek site on March 3rd. AMC was the only Korean hospital to appear among the top ranks and compete with the world’s greatest hospitals. In addition, AMC maintained its position as the best Korean hospital for three consecutive years since Newsweek first released the World’s Best Hospitals rankings in 2019.

 

In this year’s list, Mayo Clinic, a U.S.-based medical practice was named the world’s best hospital, followed by Cleveland Clinic (U.S.), Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School (U.S.), Toronto General – University Health Network (Canada), and the Johns Hopkins Hospital (U.S.).

 

AMC already entered the top global lists in all 6 categories of Newsweek’s World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2021 announced last year. AMC was the only Korean hospital to enter the top global 50 list in all 6 areas: endocrinology (4th), gastroenterology (6th); oncology (7th); neurology (8th); orthopedics (12th); and cardiology (36th).

The Asan Foundation held a ceremony for the 14th Asan Award in Medicine on March 18 at Grand Hyatt Hotel, Seoul. The Award in Basic Medicine went to Ronald Evans from the Salk Institute, U.S.A. and the Award in Clinical Medicine went to Professor Bon-Kwon Koo of the Department of Internal Medicine at SNU College of Medicine. These two awardees received USD 250,000 (ca. KRW 300 million) and KRW 300 million, respectively. KRW 50 million was awarded to Professor Jin-Hong Kim of the School of Biological Science at SNU and Professor Chang-hoon Yoo of the Department of Internal Medicine at University of Ulsan College of Medicine (Associate Professor of the Department of Oncology at AMC), respectively, and total KRW 700 million was awarded to these four awardees.

Clinical Instructor Park Hyo-jung from the Department of Radiology received the Excellence Prize at the 54^th Yuhan Medicine Awards. The Yuhan Medicine Awards sponsored by Yuhan Corporation and supervised by the Seoul Medical Association is aimed at encouraging those in the field of medicine to carry out research and directing the future of medicine.

Professor Lee Bu-kyu of Dentistry received the Prime Minister’s Commendation at the opening event of Medical Korea 2021: The 11^th Global Healthcare and Medical Tourism Conference. Dr. Lee received the honor in recognition of his contribution to the advancement of Korean dental technology.

AMC was selected as the most respected hospital in Korea for 15 consecutive years. ‘Korea’s Most Respected Hospital’ award is given to hospitals that received the best reviews from patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals in terms of medical performance and social contributions.

 

The survey analyzed the results of 12,982 people, including 9,127 industry executives, 255 securities analysts, and 3,600 general customers, evaluating the quality of innovation, management capabilities, employee values, customer values, social values, and image value. AMC received excellent reviews in all categories, including 12 detailed elements and overall evaluation. Particularly in categories of quality medical care, welfare and working environment, talent development, preference, innovation activities, and reliability were highly scored.

 

AMC was also included in Korea’s Top 30 Corporations that encompasses all industries in Korea for 8 consecutive years. An official of the Korea Management Association Consulting (KMAC), an organizer of the survey, said “Global companies model on a respected company. Leading magazines of developed countries such as Fortune of the United States and Financial Times of the United Kingdom also provide relevant awards, believing that becoming a respected company is the value many corporations have to pursue. This title is very meaningful for us since healthcare professionals from rival hospitals evaluated the overall quality of diverse values and recognized us as the best.”

 

In the World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2021 by Newsweek that listed a ranking of 50 best global hospitals, AMC is the only Korean hospital included in the top 50 in six specialties: specifically, the 4th in Endocrinology and Metabolism, the 6th in Gastroenterology, the 7th in Cancer Treatment, the 8th in Neurology, the 12th in Orthopedic Surgery, and the 36th in Cardiology. Even in the Global Top 100 Hospitals recently published by Newsweek, AMC ranked the top among Korean hospitals for two years in a row, grading up with famous hospitals in the world such as Mayo Clinic, MD Anderson Cancer Center, and Cleveland Clinic of the United States.

Professor Ko Beom-seok’s team from the Division of Breast Surgery, conducted a study on stage II and stage III breast cancer patients who received mastectomy after neoadjuvant chemotherapy involving a comparative analysis of 209 patients who had undergone nipple- and skin-preserving mastectomy and 209 patients who had received total mastectomy among by tracking them for six years from January 2010 to November 2016.The results showed the local recurrence-free rate and overall survival rate were 91.6% and 87.6%, respectively, for the group that had received nipple- and skin-preserving mastectomy, and these results were comparable to those of the group that had received total mastectomy at 95.8% and 84.8%, respectively.

Among the 209 patients who had received nipple- and skin-preserving mastectomy, 30 were suspected of tumor invasion in the nipple, but a tumor was not detected in an examination of a sub-areolar frozen section after neoadjuvant chemotherapy, based on which nipple- and skin-preserving mastectomy was recommended. These patients were subject to follow-up observations for 6 years, during which there was no evidence of local recurrence in any of them. This study has thus proven the safety of post-chemotherapy nipple- and skin-preserving mastectomy in a time when there is a growing number of cases of conducting after neoadjuvant chemotherapy to reduce the size of the tumor before surgery for patients with breast cancer. This means that even if tumor invasion is suspected in the nipple, if the patient responds well to neoadjuvant chemotherapy, it is possible to preserve the nipple, without increasing the risk of recurrence.

The findings of this study were recently published in Annals of Surgery, a leading journal in the field of surgery.

On February 25, the ASAN Foundation offered 4.4 billion won in scholarships to 713 Asan Scholarship students for 2021, including 50 graduate students in biomedical sciences, 583 undergraduate students, and 80 high school students.

 

The number of biomedical sciences-majored graduate student recipients increased every year from 7 in 2017 when the category was newly established, to reach 50 including 35 domestic students and 15 overseas students. Each recipient will be supported with 20 to 40 million won a year until they graduate.

 

The recipients of undergraduate student scholarships will be offered with full tuition fees and they include 127 students on the brink of quitting studies due to financial difficulties (Narae Scholarship), 32 students who devoted themselves to studies despite physical disabilities (Dasom Scholarship), 58 students who shared their knowledge and talents with underprivileged people (Talent Sharing Scholarship), and 136 students with excellent academic performance (Academic Scholarship) as well as 230 students for MIU (Men In Uniform) Children Scholarship designed to encourage and install a sense of pride in public safety personnel such as soldiers, police, firefighters, and maritime police.

 

For 159 recipients of Narae Scholarship and Dasom Scholarship, additional 200,000 won would be offered every month as living expenses in order to ease their financial burden and help them concentrate on studying. The ASAN Foundation also selected 80 e-learning scholarship students who will be supported with online learning coupons and education materials.

 

Since its establishment in 1977, the ASAN Foundation has provided scholarships worth 78.3 billion won to 35,000 students.

A team led by Professor Yong-hee Kim in the Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery successfully performed the 500th robot-assisted surgery for esophageal cancer on Mr. Kim (man, 64). Conventional surgical approach to esophageal cancer makes large-sized incisions, causing much postoperative pain and long recovery time to patients. However, the robot-assisted surgery makes less than 1 cm-sized four or five incisions in the chest and abdomen, minimizing surgical scars, pain, and complications.

 

At the Esophageal Cancer Center of AMC Cancer Institute, medical specialists gather together to develop the best surgical option that fits each patient. This multidisciplinary collaboration results in increasing the number of patients who received surgery for esophageal cancer at AMC about 1.7 times than 10 years ago, and 60% of the patients chose the robot-assisted surgery.

 

With experience in various robot-assisted surgeries, the team has extended the scope of application even to patients with late-stage esophageal cancer or who received radiation therapy as well as those who are old or whose heart or lungs are weak.

A research team led by Professor Song-cheol Kim in the Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery and Professor Eun-sung Jeon in the Department of Convergence Medicine in cooperation with researchers at the Korea Advanced Institute for Science and Technology (KAIST) and the Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology (KRIBB) discovered the cause of appetite loss in cancer patients.

 

More than 50% of cancer patients experience a continuous loss in appetite and weight as complications from cancer. This is called a syndrome of cancer cachexia. This accounts for 10~20% of causes of death in cancer patients.

 

The research team found a mechanism of appetite suppression in which a specific protein (Dilp8·INSL3) created and secreted from cancer cells works with a specific receptor (Lgr3·Lgr8). They also investigated its clinical relevance in pancreas cancer patients with the highest prevalence of cachexia, and found that the concentration of INSL3 was significantly high in pancreas cancer patients suffering from eating disorders. The findings are expected to open the possibility of developing medicine for cancer-induced appetite loss by regulating the signal transduction system with INSL3, contributing to a huge improvement in cancer patients’ quality of life and the effects of chemotherapy.  

 

The research findings were published in the latest issue of online edition of Nature Cell Biology, an international journal in cell biology.

Professor Park, Duk-woo from the Division of Cardiology has been named Deputy Editor of JACC Asia, a journal launched by the American Heart Association. JACC Asia, a sister paper of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the official journal of the American Heart Association, was newly launched in recognition of the growing importance of conducting cardiovascular disease research in consideration of different patient characteristics across continents. Currently, the formation of the editorial committee, which include cardiovascular disease specialists from East Asia, is being finalized.

Professor Sung, Kyung-rim from the Department of Ophthalmology has been chosen as the Chairperson of the Scientific Committee of the Asia-Pacific Glaucoma Society. The Asia-Pacific Glaucoma Congress is held once every two years, and Dr. Sung will organize the congress, seminars, and other programs.

Professor LEE JUNYEOP from the Department of Ophthalmology has recently been chosen for the Novartis Innovative Research Support Program, a program that has been launched by Novartis, a global pharmaceutical company, to support creative researchers in developing and commercializing innovative new drugs. A total of six researchers from world-famous research institutions, including Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Cornell University School of medicine, and Dr. Lee was the sole researcher selected outside North America. Dr. Lee will receive about KRW 1.1 billion over the next three years until 2023 to develop a new drug for macular degeneration, for which there is currently no cure.

The risk of the development of cardiovascular disease is higher in middle-aged disabled people, below 50 years and with not severe conditions, compared to elderly disabled people with severe conditions. This proved that the disability itself might become a risk factor for the incidence of cardiovascular disease. A research team led by Professors Young-sik Kim and Ki Young Son in the department of Family Medicine analyzed the incidence and mortality rate in relation to cardiovascular disease for around 510,000 disabled and non-disabled people aged between 40 and 79 within the period of 2002–2015 using the national health insurance cohort database.

 

As a result, the mortality rate of disabled people with cardiovascular disease was found to be higher as compared to non-disabled people, specifically 3.2 times higher in the case of disabled people with not severe conditions and 1.7 times in disabled people with severe conditions. In particular, the mortality rate of disabled people under 50 differed by 2.5–6.3 times depending on the severity of their disability and specifically by 2.6–3.5 times in those people aged between 50 and 64 and by 1.5 to 2.7 times in those above 65 years.

 

Thus, it was clear that the incidence of cardiovascular disease was higher in disabled people than non-disabled people, particularly those aged below 50. The incidence rate was 1.4 times higher in disabled people with not severe conditions and by 1.5 times in disabled people with severe conditions. The incidence was also higher by 5.5 times in disabled people between 50 and 64 years and by 3.3–4.6 times in those aged between 50 and 64.

 

The research team also realized that medical professionals find it difficult to manage the general health of disabled people and to provide general disability care. Based on this fact, the team developed a clinical care manual for the medical staff and education materials for disabled patients. The National Rehabilitation Center published those significant documents last year. The research team received a commendation from the Minister of Health and Welfare of the Republic of Korea for contributing to the health promotion of disabled people. The study finding was published in Plos One, an online international journal in the USA.

As AMC Cancer Institute is committed to providing personalized medicine, multidisciplinary care, and an integrated platform for prescribing precise medicine while running the Clinic of Quality of Life Enhancement for Cancer Patients, more than one million cancer patients visited AMC last year.

 

According to the recently published annual report of AMC Cancer Institute, 1,037,050 cancer patients (man-days) visited AMC in 2020, including 963,579 outpatients and 73,471 inpatients. The number of patients diagnosed with cancer and newly registered cancer patients in 2020 amounted to 29,764 (actual number). Based on the cancer registration statistics recently published by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the number of newly registered cancer patients every year is about 240,000, one in eight local cancer patients who visited AMC.

 

Last year, 19,320 cancer surgeries, 183,642 chemotherapies, and 115,149 radiotherapies were performed at AMC. Around 3,831 next-generation sequencing (NGS) genetic tests, which are receiving much attention in the era of precision medicine, were also performed. This is a significant increase from 1,810 in 2018 and 2,843 in 2019. It may be due to the expansion in the number of types of cancer that were subjected to testing.

 

In 2020, 4,912 multidisciplinary care cases were handled, wherein five to six specialists gathered together to diagnose cancer and discuss surgery and chemotherapy to provide personalized treatment to each patient. This corresponds to a 12 times increase from 418 in 2006 when the multidisciplinary care system was first introduced.

 

Cancer research continues at AMC. In 2020, 468 articles were written by the researchers at AMC Cancer Institute; more than 25 articles were published in journals with 20 citation index, such as Journal of Clinical Oncology, Journal of Hepatology, and JAMA Surgery, while 131 articles were published in journals with 5 citation index. Besides, 439 clinical trials were carried out during research, almost doubling from 205 trials in 2019.

 

Thanks to such achievements, AMC ranked at the position seventh in cancer category of the World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2021 by Newsweek in October 2020, recognized by a recommendation panel comprising 40,000medical professionals from 21 countries. 

During cancer surgery, some of the lymph nodes surrounding cancer cells are removed altogether to prevent further spreading. Here, lymphedema causing painful and uncomfortable swelling of arms and legs post-surgery is a typical complication that degrades the quality of life of cancer patients.

 

Lymphaticovenous anastomosis is a highly sophisticated microvascular surgery that helps lymphatic circulation by linking the damaged lymph vessels to veins. This approach was recently proven to be effective even in patients with severe lower limb lymphedema.

 

A research team led by Professors Joon Pio Hong, Hyun Suk Suh, and Changsik Park in the Department of Plastic Surgery and Professor JaeYong Jeon in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine performed lymphaticovenous anastomosis on 42 patients with severe lower limb lymphedema between the late stage II and stage III, where lymph vessels are still properly functioning. As a result, the volume of lower limb lymphedema increased by 14% on average and by 15.2% and 15.5% after three months and six months, respectively. In the case of cellulitis, due to the occurrence of severe complications as a result of bacterial invasion into the site of lymphedema, the annual average cases dropped from 0.84 before surgery to 0.07 after surgery.

 

Since lymphaticovenous anastomosis is performed in the thin vessel with a diameter of 0.2~0.6㎜, patients can recover fast and its efficacy is also great. In the surgery, a minimum 2.5 ㎝-sized incision is made after the administration of local anesthesia, instead of general anesthesia. Simultaneous performance of lymph node transplantation and lymphaticovenous anastomosis is also possible.

 

The study finding was published in the Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Journal.

A research team led by Professor Hong-ju Park in the department of Otorhinolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery has newly developed a program that can predict the outcome of cochlear implantation using the brain MRI data of patients with prolonged hearing loss in order to identify the degree of shrinkage of the cerebral cortex.

 

The cochlear implantation outcome has been estimated on the basis of how long hearing loss had been present and the age and level of hearing loss of the patient; however now, this new program adds a scientific method of imaging to make more accurate predictions. This study allows patients to see the expected effects of cochlear implantation.

 

In collaboration with neurology specialists at the University of Southern California, the research team compared the brain MRI data of 94 adult patients with severe hearing loss who received cochlear implantation at AMC and the brain MRI data of 37 adults with a normal cerebral cortex. As a result, it was found that the longer the hearing loss lasted, the more the volume of the cerebral cortex shrank, including the temporal lobe of the brain’s upper and left region that controls hearing and speaking. It was also found that the more the cerebral cortex region for speaking shrank, the better the outcome of cochlear implantation was.

 

Inspired by the fact that reverse tracking the degree of brain shrinkage can predict the prognosis of cochlear implantation, according to the levels of speech understanding, the research team developed an AI-based program that can analyze the patterns of changes in the cerebral cortex of patients with hearing loss.

 

The study finding was published in the latest issue of Human Brain Mapping.

In 2020, a total of 3,100,479 patients visited AMC. The figure fell by 0.6% in comparison to 2019; this might have happened due to a decrease in outpatients and more isolated beds being allocated to COVID-19 patients.

 

Out of the total patient population for 2020, 2,961,233 were outpatients and 139,246 were inpatients. Compared to 2,974,392 outpatients and 146,057 inpatients in 2019, the above-mentioned figures seem to have fallen by 0.4% and 4.7%, respectively. The number of surgeries performed at AMC in 2020 was 66,838, which is 388 fewer cases than the year before.

 

Last year, 11,784 overseas patients received treatment at AMC, which marks a 41.2% drop from 20,025 patients in 2019. This may also be due to travel restrictions imposed as a result of COVID-19. Overseas patients are comprised of 11,072 outpatients, 352 inpatients, and 360 health checkup examinees. A total of 3,527 patients (30%) were from the United States, while ▲1,314(11%) were from the UAE, ▲1,145(10%) from China, ▲1,054(9%) from Mongolia, ▲968(8%) from Saudi Arabia, ▲624(5%) from Kazakhstan, and ▲475(4%) from Vietnam (See Graphic).

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is not related to alcohol consumption. It is rather an inflammatory disease that is caused by having a high-fat diet and lack of exercise, which result in the accumulation of fat in the liver. One in five patients succumbs to hepatocirrhosis (hepatic fibrosis) or liver cancer, and liver transplantation is the only treatment for NAFLD. Recently, as the number of NAFLD patients has soared due to the rapid increase in the obese population, AMC’s research team became the first one to identify the mechanism of NAFLD.

 

The research team led by Professor Eun-hee Koh in the Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism recently announced their discovery of an increased expression of SMS1·sphingomyelin synthase 1 in the hepatocytes of rats with NAFLD, which resulted in the inflammation and fibrosis of liver tissues. Their findings were reconfirmed through a clinical test conducted on humans by the joint research team at the National Institute of Barcelona, Spain.

 

The research team discovered through an experiment of rats that diacylglycerol created by SMS1·sphingomyelin synthase 1 sequentially activates the NLRC4 inflammasome gene involved in PKC-δ, which accelerates apoptosis and inflammatory regulation. It was also identified that it resulted in the increase in apoptosis(pyroptosis) caused by a strong inflammatory reaction to liver cells and activated the NLRP3 inflammasome gene that induces inflammation and fibrosis reaction by means of the danger signals released from hepatocytes.

 

The research team anticipated that the mechanism of NAFLD progress they had identified would speed up the development of a medicine that can effectively control the transition of NAFLD into liver cirrhosis. The study finding was recently published in the online edition of GUT, a leading journal in gastroenterology.