Konkuk University Medical Center Aims at Joining Nation’s Top 5

Newly inaugurated Paik reveals his medical institution’s goals and tasks

Paik Nam-sun, vice chairman of the Korean Cancer Society and a time-honored cancer specialist, took office as the director of the Konkuk University Medical Center on July 17. In a recent interview with NewsWorld, Paik specified his future plans designed to realize the medical center’s goal of joining the ranks of the top five medical institutions across the nation. He also concurrently serves as co-president of the Organization Committee of the 7th Biennial Meeting of the Asian Breast Cancer Society (ABSC 2009), which will coincide with the Global Breast Cancer Conference 2009, to be held at the Sheraton Grand Walkerhill in Seoul from Oct. 8-10.
Question: Congratulations on your inauguration as the 25th director of the Konkuk University Medical Center. How do you feel about it?
Answer: It is a great honor for me to take office as the director of the medical institution and I extend a whole-hearted thanks to Kim Kyung-hee, chairman of the board of directors of the medical center, who appointed me. I take on my own shoulders the mission of realizing the vision “2015 Top 5.”
Q: What management tenets do you hold as important?
A: I can sum up three things. First, I focus on making our medical center one patients consider worth revisiting. To this end, we’re striving to transform the medical center into a medical delivery system so that flat-out medical treatment can be attained together with fast and precise diagnoses and services tailored to meet patients’ demands. Secondly, we’ll devote ourselves to creating an environment in which members of our organization can communicate and be integrated well, making the medical center a hospital with which we can take pride and rejoice. In particular, I’ll try to show that management and labor are partners, not those who confront each other and good ideas of our community will be shared and utilized as a force behind our development. Lastly, we’ll put our hearts and souls into enhancing its brand, creating new values and making our institution highly productive. All executives and staff members, including myself, will devote ourselves to realizing the goal of offering flat-out medical services and becoming a top-noted educational and research institution.
Q: Your medical center has come up with the new catchphrase “Patient Friendly, Medical Utopia.” What does it mean?
A: We aim at offering flat-out services during which we will treat our patients in a kindly manner like we would our friends. Some people think that hospitals are all about doctors, but the reality is that 25 percent has to do with medical practices and the remaining 75 percent has to do with services outside of the medical field. Patients wish to receive humane respect and better services. This is the reason we have come up with the catchphrase “Patient Friendly, Medical Utopia.”
Q: You have declared a willingness to establish a specialized cancer center. How do you plan to implement the project?
A: In order to realize the goal, it is prerequisite to overcome cancers, and in reality, the Konkuk University Medical Center has insufficient infrastructure in that field. We have built a foundation for the inauguration of a cancer center by recruiting well-respected doctors and by forming a team of professors starting last year. However, our medical institution has no capacity to handle all forms of cancer, so we will run a cancer center specializing in a few specific forms of cancer.
Q: Korean hospitals have a keen interest in attracting patients from foreign countries under a medical tourism project. What’s your medical institution’s strategy in this field?
A: Lately, attracting foreign patients is the much talked-about subject in the Korean medical community. Korea stands at the top among medical institutions around the world in terms of medical treatment standards. We can find our improved standing at meetings of foreign medical societies ― something Korea needs to publicize abroad. We’re positively considering establishing a medical service center exclusively catering to patients traveling from abroad. Our medical institution plans to initially conduct publicity activities to attract Korean residents living in China, the United States and Japan.
Q: I’ve heard that Konkuk University Medical Center has an aggressive manpower resource plan in place. Is there any opposition to that move?
A: The existing medical personnel do not oppose it since it is considered as a way to expand their capability. Every one concurs on the need to differentiate those who work hard from those who do not. We’re studying an option of requiring SCI thesis records, departing from the conventional system of automatically moving from a fellow to a clinical instructor and an assistant professor along the medical professor hierarchy.
Q: The daily number of outpatients has surpassed the 1,000 mark since you moved here 10 months ago. Your medical institution has made great strides, and it is expected to make another leap forward in the years to come. What tasks do you wish to fulfill within your term?
A: The tasks I have to accomplish during my tenure are to help Konkuk University Medical Center join the ranks of the top five medical institutions and establish a cancer center specializing in five major cancers. It means that we will not target external growth, but will try to do our best to see that patents find it worthwhile to revisit our medical institution by offering excellent services , and we’re trying to put our money where our mouth is ― becoming an excellent medical institution by building our capability. Our medical institution is striving to crank up our standing by establishing both a heart center and a cancer center. nw

(left)Paik Nam-sun, director of the Konkuk University Medical Center. A view of the Konkuk University Medical Center