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Message from Director

Message from Director

Kyoto University Hospital is committed to providing safe, reliable medical care based on three basic principles relating to its mission as a university hospital to engage in treatment, research, and training: (1) Providing safe and high-quality medical care as a patient-centered hospital; (2) Contributing to society through the development and practice of new treatments; and (3) Fostering medical professionals with a sense of mission, responsibility as well as compassion.

Based on a master plan formulated in 2013 to describe the future shape of Kyoto University Hospital as a hospital responsible for highly advanced medical care and advanced acute care, we are pressing ahead with the installation of facilities and equipment and the creation of organizations. The first of our facilities improvements was the opening of the South Ward building (for the treatment of lifestyle-related diseases) in 2015, followed by the opening in 2019 of the Middle Ward building (for advanced acute care), which contains not only a super-ICU for the most severely ill patients but also numerous other care units, including an Emergency and Stroke Intensive Care Unit (ES-ICU) for acute stroke patients and a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for seriously ill newborn babies. Ki-CONNECT (Kyoto Innovation Center for Next Generation Clinical Trials and iPS Cell Therapy) was launched the next year as a new organization with the objective of developing next-generation medical treatments. Most recently, in 2021 the Department of Psychiatry was relocated from the West Campus to the North Ward, emergency model beds were installed, and the Tuberculosis Care Unit was enlarged to enable the treatment of novel infections. Renovation of the Surgery Unit is currently on-going, and efforts to enhance the hospital’s functions continue.

Kyoto University Hospital has been legally designated as a Clinical Research Core Hospital, a Designated Cancer Care Hospital, a Cancer Genome Medicine Core Hospital, a Pediatric Cancer Core Hospital, and a Center for Maternal, Fetal and Neonatal Medicine, among others, and is proceeding with the establishment of organizational structures to improve its medical care frameworks. The hospital has set up various interdisciplinary medical centers, including its Cancer Center, Center for Research and Application of Cellular Therapy, Children’s Medical Center, Moyamoya Disease Support Center, Center for von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) Disease, Swallowing Center, and others, creating systems that are also capable of treating rare diseases. In 2022, a Patient Flow Management (PFM) Center was also established to support patients at all stages of the treatment process, from outpatient treatment to hospital admission and discharge.

What is required of Kyoto University Hospital is the development and implementation of new forms of medical care that offer hope to patients. Through research on iPS cells and other techniques, we are working to develop world-first, innovative medical care in order to provide completely novel therapies and drugs as quickly as possible for patients with diseases with unknown causes and mechanisms, or diseases for which there is no effective treatment.

As a hospital providing advanced acute care, we believe that Kyoto University Hospital should be rooted in the local community and contribute to enhancing local medical care. The hospital treats among the largest number of cases requiring emergency medical treatment of any national university hospital in Japan, including patients with acute diseases such as heart attack, aortic aneurysm, and cerebral stroke. We will engage in even closer collaboration with local doctors, hospitals, and clinics, focusing on the practice of safe, reliable emergency medicine that provides a solid support for patients throughout the region.

The current fraught world situation and the effects of the long-drawn-out COVID-19 pandemic mean that major changes are required, not only in the medical world but in society as a whole.
“Groundbreaking clinical research that can be broadcast worldwide”
“Bringing the latest advanced medical care to as many patients as possible”
“Contributing to optimum local medical care in collaboration with local hospitals and clinics”
In the post-COVID era, our entire hospital staff is united in pressing ahead to achieve these goals at an even higher level than before. We are making every effort with the aim of providing every patient with safe, high-quality medical care that they can trust, and look forward to your continued support in future.

Akifumi Takaori, M.D., Ph.D.
Director of Kyoto University Hospital