The Affiliated Hospital of Yangming Jiaotong University holds an international seminar to celebrate its 130th anniversary to plan "no walls" smart health in Yilan

The Hospital Affiliated to National Yang-Ming Chiao Tung University celebrated its 130th anniversary and today joined hands with National Yilan University to host the 16th International Medical Symposium. (Photo by reporter Wang Junqi)

[Reporter Wang Junqi/Report from Yilan] The Affiliated Hospital of National Yang-Ming Chiao Tung University celebrates its 130th anniversary. Today (7), it joins hands with National University of Yilan to host the 16th International Medical Symposium, focusing on topics such as sustainable medical care, childhood myopia prevention and treatment, cardiovascular care, and generative AI. A series of hospital celebration activities have been launched in full swing since the 4th, showing that the century-old hospital is in line with the vision of future smart medical care and planning a smart and healthy Yilan with "no walls"!

Huang Zhixian, Director of the Hospital Affiliated to Yangming Jiaotong University, said that four generations of his family have served here. Old photos are the living history of the hospital. Yilan’s population of more than 400,000 is a microcosm of Taiwan. It is a very good community model. With the support of Yangming Jiaotong University’s abundant resources, we will make every effort to implement teaching and research. We hope to build "Healthy Yilan" into a cutting-edge and model nationwide on the basis of 130 years of solid foundation.

Lin Qihong, President of Yangtze River Jiaotong University, said that this year (2026) is the fifth year of joint schooling. Coincidentally, Jiaotong University was founded in 1896 and Yilan Hospital was established in the same year, which is a rare connection in 130 years. Yilan is a very suitable place to establish a medical model. The school will work with the hospital to deeply explore the integration of community and hospital-based medical care to create a future service model.

This seminar mainly discusses the shift of medical care from treatment to prevention. Luo Yijun, director of the Department of Disease Control and Prevention of the Ministry of Health and Welfare, shared Taiwan's 40 years of experience in epidemic prevention and control from response to prevention; Professor Katsuhisa Kojima of Josai International University in Japan analyzed the impact of population aging. Former Minister of Health and Welfare Qiu Wenta talked about the concept of "hospital without walls" and outlined a vision for medical care to be deeply embedded in families and communities.

The Affiliated Hospital of Yangtze River University said that in terms of local practice, the hospital has been deeply involved in children's vision protection for many years, promoting "Everyday Outdoor 120" and early intervention, which has reduced the myopia rate among Yilan's large-scale children from 15.4% to about 8%. The team has also actively promoted early-stage myopia prevention and piloted the "Natural Landscape Classroom" to create a learning environment for children to protect their eyesight and implement preventive medicine.

Cardiovascular care has been honed over the past 20 years. The Affiliated Hospital of Yangtze River University has successfully built a medical center-level system, taking the lead in introducing cutting-edge technologies such as pulsed field ablation, transcatheter aortic valve replacement, and 3T cardiac magnetic resonance imaging, which has greatly strengthened Yilan's emergency and critical care capacity. It not only saves people from traveling across regions for medical treatment, but also firmly establishes a century-old medical guardianship.

At the International Medical Seminar organized by the Affiliated Hospital of Yangming Jiaotong University, Dean Huang Zhixian (4th from left) takes a group photo with Director of Disease Control and Prevention Luo Yijun (4th from right) and others. (Photo by reporter Wang Junqi)