Our mission continues to make an impact worldwide
As I begin to write this, I am looking out my 17th-floor guest room window in Hangzhou, China. I am here to once again acknowledge the special relationship we have with Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital (SRRSH), a remarkable institution now ranked as one of the top-tier hospitals in the entire country of China. Started as a partnership some 30 years ago between Zhejiang University School of Medicine and Loma Linda University, with funding from the Shaw Foundation, the initial hospital has now grown from 400 beds in one tower to 2,100 beds in six towers. By next year, SRRSH will have grown to five campuses in Hangzhou with 6,400 beds.
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At my first visit some 25 years ago, the initial hospital tower was on the edge of the city, with farmlands beyond and bicycles crowding the roads. Now the sky is full of construction cranes, dubbed the national “bird” of China. The aphorism that “a rising tide lifts all boats” is certainly true here, as the roads are now jammed with Teslas, Mercedes, and BMWs, nearly equal the number of Hondas and Toyotas, with a few new Chinese models as well! The few scooters are all electric and noiseless, poising a bit of a risk for pedestrians, as you don’t hear them coming! The economic miracle of China over the past three decades has certainly transformed this country.
Our role in Hangzhou has morphed from primarily assisting in developing the hospital and clinical services to strengthening various educational programs. Five years ago, we partnered with another institution here, called Hangzhou City University, together with SRRSH, to establish the International Institute of Health Sciences. We introduced two new disciplines to China — dental hygiene and respiratory therapy. A modified curriculum was developed, teachers recruited, simulation labs built out, and last week we graduated our first class of 18 dental hygienists, the first formally trained dental hygienists in China. The first class of respiratory therapists will graduate in two years. Both degrees are first of their kind in this vast country.
I also had the opportunity to visit Zhejiang University Children’s Hospital (ZUCH), our partner with Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital since 2006. There I met a number of alumni and current students in our Loma Linda University School of Nursing off-campus master’s program in nursing education. More than two dozen nurses, primarily from Hangzhou, have earned this degree from one of the four previous cohorts. What an honor to visit with our alumni and hear about the impact they are making on nursing leadership throughout China.
During this trip to Hangzhou, we began a new initiative, called the “SRRSH and Loma Linda University Health International Training Academy for Healthcare” (SALITAH). This will focus on advanced clinical training, both for SRRSH’s physicians as well as those from other parts of China and even internationally. SALITAH will build on the incredible reputation that SRRSH has developed in the clinical world for advanced techniques of various kinds.
Next year we will celebrate Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital’s 30th anniversary. This partnership has produced many personal friendships as hundreds of faculty, staff, and students have spent time on each other’s campus. Perhaps most remarkable is the cultural endorsement this government hospital has made, mirroring Loma Linda University’s values. They have adopted “Sincerity, Confidence, and Love” as their own values, with an added commitment to “Honesty, Respect, Commitment, Unity, and Excellence.” LLU is also proud to be an integral part of their logo, with Zhejiang University Medicine (ZUM) on the left and Loma Linda University (LLU) on the right.
But Hangzhou was my second stop on a round-the-world itinerary for me. My first stop was in Uganda, along with over 80 faculty, staff, and students from Loma Linda University, Nigeria, Malawi, and Nepal. We had come together to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Ishaka Adventist Hospital in south central Uganda. Started by two classmates from the LLU School of Medicine class of 1946, Drs. Mildred and Don Stilson, this mission hospital has provided thousands with advanced medical care over the years. Even more remarkable is that Dr. Mildred Stilson is still living at 102 in Loma Linda, and followed these recent events with interest.
With medical teams providing free care and performing surgeries at Ishaka, Bugema Adventist University clinic, and in the city of Jinja, the numbers of patients kept coming, with 8,800 visits in Ishaka and over 12,000 at all three sites over the course of the week. There was some initial tension the first few days after the high school massacre on the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, but the team was safe in each location.
It is appropriate to question the lasting value of such a trip, costing several hundred thousand dollars in travel and support costs. Clearly the clinical impact of corrective surgeries is significant, while treating chronic diseases like hypertension and diabetes is of marginal help in the long term. But the impact on our students is life-changing and permanent, creating many “teachable moments” in their lives that will live with them forever. It is why we do what we do, making these exposures to human need an integral part of the Loma Linda University curricula.
So I bring you reports from two widely disparate corners of the world, both impacted by Loma Linda University in unique ways. The ripples caused by our engagement over the past 118 years continue to spread. I am humbled to be part of an institution that claims this world as its stage. As Socrates said, “Education is the lighting of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.” May those flames continue to burn bright.
Sincerely,
Richard H. Hart, MD, DrPH
President
Loma Linda University Health
