CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL
Since its opening in 2009, AMC Children’s Hospital has been dedicated to fulfilling the hopes and dreams of our pediatric patients, who suffer from rare and intractable diseases. AMC Children’s Hospital is comprised of 21 departments and 6 specialized centers with a total of 259 beds. Each department and center is designed to deliver top-notch, highly specialized and comprehensive care to pediatric patients.
SIGNIFICANT ACHIEVEMENTS
- Korea’s largest number of PICU, NICU
- Korea’s largest number of Twin-Twin Transfusion •Korea’s first designated pediatric emergency center (2010) •Korea’s largest pediatric and neonatal intensive care unit •Korea’s largest number of pediatric heart surgery cases
- Korea’s largest number of pediatric liver and heart transplantation cases •Korea’s largest number of scoliosis surgery cases
- Korea’s largest number of pediatric bone marrow transplantation cases •Family-oriented newborn unit which UNICEF designated
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Giving a New Life to a Newborn with a Life-Saving Heart Surgery
A one-year-old newborn infant in Nepal, Srijan, received a diagnosis that he would only live for three days. He was born with transposition of the great arteries, a congenital heart defect. He needed surgery as soon as possible, but Nepal’s poor medical infrastructure made this impossible.
On January 11, 2020, Srijan’s parents received a ray of hope: a team of medical volunteers from Asan Medical Center, they learned, was coming to Nepal. The pediatric cardiologist Yong-hee Kim, who had been treating Srijan, requested that the surgery be performed by Dr. Tae-jin Yun of the Pediatric Cardiac Surgery Department, who was in Korea. Soon, a project to urgently transport Srijan began.
With the support of the Asan Medical Center, Srijan arrived in Korea in just two weeks, and, on January 29, the surgery was performed. The switched positions of his pulmonary artery and aorta were corrected with an arterial switch operation, and the holes in his heart ventricles were repaired. On February 17, Srijan was discharged and returned safely to his home country.
Borders and Pandemic Can’t Stop us from Treating a Pediatric Patient with Brain Tumor
Temuulen was a healthy 10-year-old Mongolian boy who loved riding horses and doing exercises. But then, whenever he ate food, he began vomiting and getting debilitating headaches. He was diagnosed with ependymoma, and local physicians recommended that he travel to Korea for treatment.
Despite the difficulties posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Temuulen managed to arrive in Korea on a chartered plane. However, his condition was so severe that he couldn’t afford to undergo a two-week quarantine.
After getting tested COVID-19 at the airport and national quarantine facilities, he was allowed by the Asan Medical Center to be immediately hospitalized. According to Dr. Young-shin Ra, waiting for him until his quarantine was over was dangerous considering Temuulen’s condition, and so his surgery date was moved forward, and emergency surgery was conducted over the weekend.
After the one-hour surgery, Dr. Ra gave the good news to Temuulen’s father: “We removed 99% of the tumor. The 1% which is attached to blood vessels can be treated with radiation, and if we’re careful for the next two or three years, the odds of recurrence are low.” No interpreter was needed to convey the father’s gratitude.
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