Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital

- Over 20 Years of Outstanding Accomplishments by Dr. Kim's ENT Service -

Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital held a ceremony on December 9, 2008, in celebration of achieving 3,000 Chronic Otitis Media (COM) surgeries performed by Dr. Hyung-Jong Kim, professor of otolaryngology, and his faculty members for the last 20 years.

It should be a rarity at home and abroad for a surgeon to perform 3,000 COM surgeries. On top of this, Dr. Kim is managing electronic medical records to efficiently check patients' health conditions. He has evolved his COM care program into being a part of the Korean Society of Otolaryngology projects. The program includes guidelines for the classification of denominating Korean COM operations and surgery reports.

His database shows that patients between 2 and 84 years of age have undergone the operations. Among them, 44 percent were male and 56 percent were female. The ratio of patients who had first operations to second ones was 9 to1. Otitis media was observed in one ear (2,330 cases, 78 percent), or both ears (670 cases, percent).

"This all could not have been possible by a single person. True dedication and contribution by all the otolaryngologists and staff members have simply made it possible. I will direct my efforts towards specializing our service to provide quality patient care as well as actively nurturing our young otolaryngology professionals." Dr. Kim said.

By Younghee Han, Int'l Operations Team, HUMC