"Father" of emergency resuscitation

Professor Vu Van Dinh received the "Lifetime Contribution" award

By chance, I had the opportunity to meet and talk with the founder of Vietnam's emergency resuscitation industry. He is Professor Vu Van Dinh, from Hoang Dieu commune (Gia Loc).

Founder of the emergency resuscitation industry

Professor Vu Van Dinh was born in 1933, in Phong Lam village, Hoang Dieu commune (Gia Loc). Seven years of studying at the University of Medicine and Pharmacy (now Hanoi Medical University) gave him a solid foundation of medical knowledge. It was also here that he met and later married Professor Duong Thi Cuong, a "big tree" in the obstetrics industry.

Leaving the University of Medicine and Pharmacy in 1958, the young man Vu Van Dinh continued to be sent to many countries to study. Looking back at some of the places in his youth, Professor Dinh recalled his research days in the Soviet Union, his 4 years of being assigned to Africa on a mission, and his days in Cambodia when Pol Pot's army was rampant in 1977.

Recalling his fate with the field of emergency resuscitation, Professor Dinh said that since he was a student, witnessing many injured people lying on the roadside without blankets or mats until they died, he kept wondering why he could not provide timely emergency care to the patients and let them all pass away. This was also the premise and motivation that urged him to research emergency resuscitation and later founded the emergency resuscitation field in Vietnam.

The A9 Emergency Resuscitation Team (later the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department) of Bach Mai Hospital, where he worked after graduating, is also the place that holds the most unforgettable memories of his life and career in the field of emergency resuscitation.

At that time, there was a shortage of human resources and a large number of patients, so the medical team had to work under great pressure. For many days, Professor Dinh worked until he had no time to sleep. He experienced pressure that seemed suffocating, but he still devoted himself to his patients. To this day, he still remembers a patient named Trinh, an 18-year-old girl who suddenly had a high fever and had to use a ventilator for 18 years. Then there was a patient who was poisoned by pesticides and thought to have no hope, but was miraculously revived by his hands using a tibot ventilator.

- Back then, people often called A9 "Achit" because this was the most important place for patients to die and was right next to the morgue. When someone died, the staff immediately pushed them there. It was so sad and so quick that it scared the hell out of people, Mr. Dinh recalled with tears in his eyes.

His major was internal medicine, but Mr. Dinh worked as an emergency physician all his life as a predestined relationship. He developed a modern emergency resuscitation model, laid the foundation for building a nationwide emergency network, and supported the organization and professional training for emergency resuscitation departments in provinces and cities. At that time, Mr. Dinh begged for a long time to establish the department. After decades of piloting and proving its effectiveness, Professor Dinh finally built a standard model for the emergency department - the place that "shoulders" the most serious cases in hospitals. Unable to do it all at once, Mr. Dinh progressed step by step until he reached the final step of a complete emergency resuscitation model as it is today. In the early years, he and his colleagues encountered many difficulties when they had to change to work according to the new process. Every morning, the staff, doctors and nurses had a meeting first, then some went out to examine patients, some went inside to be on emergency duty, and some went to intensive care. Professor Dinh is also one of the first people in the Vietnamese medical industry to successfully apply new resuscitation methods such as electric shock, pacemaker placement, peritoneal dialysis, continuous blood filtration, artificial ventilation, etc.

After many years working at the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department, Professor Dinh realized the limitations and made a decision whose results brought a big turning point for the country's medicine. He saw the inadequacy when all accident patients for many different reasons were brought to the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department, making emergency care and treatment difficult and putting a lot of pressure. People bitten by poisonous snakes could not be given emergency care like people in traffic accidents. Applying the knowledge he learned abroad, he advised Bach Mai Hospital and the Ministry of Health to divide emergency care into 3 new specialties with a new way of working. The Examination Department is responsible for screening and taking patients to the appropriate departments, the door is always open to be the first place to receive patients. The Emergency Department is where serious cases are treated, the door is always closed so no one can enter. The Intensive Care Department can be further away.

This model has shown clear effectiveness in medical examination and treatment and is still applied in all hospitals in 63 provinces and cities.

Professor Vu Van Dinh examined patients during his working days (documentary photo)

Snake farming in A9

The story of a doctor raising snakes and a venomous snake that escaped from its cage for several days right in the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department is a memorable memory at Bach Mai Hospital at that time. The story is, in the years 1980-1982, many patients bitten by snakes were brought to the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department, but the specific antidote had to be purchased in Thailand at a very expensive price. Without the medicine, the patients had to be ventilated, had their blood filtered, and were prone to complications. Feeling sorry for the patients, Mr. Dinh asked for venomous snakes from patients and many other places to raise right in a pen next to the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department to research and prepare serum. He raised many types of venomous snakes such as banded kraits, king cobras, fat cobras, green green snakes, scorpions, red tails, etc.

One day, a strong krait escaped through the glass cage. Mr. Dinh was so worried that he slept in the department for several nights in a row, keeping his stick by his bedside ready to lie in wait. A few days later, on the stairs of the Kidney Department, people saw the snake crawling out and shouted to each other to beat it to death. From then on, Mr. Dinh was less worried about snakes biting his patients. The first batches of serum were stolen and sold before they could be tested. Mr. Dinh had to cooperate with the Pasteur Institute in Nha Trang and produce a complete serum product to treat bites from cobras and vipers.

Thanks to his dedication to research and his willingness to experiment, Mr. Dinh is the author and co-author of over 100 scientific research works. At the age of 80, he still goes to the hospital every day, goes to the lecture hall, and corrects theses for the next generation of students. Although his books contain deep technical knowledge, they are presented in a gentle, easy-to-understand, easy-to-receive language.

Golden marks

Throughout his life of dedication to the country's medical sector, with his great contributions, Professor Dinh was awarded the Second Class Resistance Medal and the title of People's Physician. He was twice awarded the title of Labor Hero and Labor Hero in the Renovation Period. The unit he worked and led, the A9 Emergency Resuscitation Department, was also twice awarded the title of Labor Hero. On September 14, 2012 in Hanoi, within the framework of the Asian Hospital Management Conference, Professor Vu Van Dinh was awarded the "Lifetime Dedication" award for health care. This is the second time a Vietnamese person has been awarded this award. With his talent and dedication, Professor Vu Van Dinh is a "big tree" of the emergency resuscitation sector, a typical example of medical ethics. He also devoted himself to teaching and training many students across the country. Doctor Nguyen The Anh, Deputy Director of the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Hai Duong province, still remembers the teacher who taught him wholeheartedly. "Perhaps he doesn't remember my name because he had many students. But surely, deep in the memories of many generations now and forever, there will never be a forgotten doctor and exemplary teacher who devoted himself to medicine, lived his life for his patients, and loved his students like his own children," said Dr. The Anh.

Until now, Mr. Dinh is still very concerned and longs for his homeland. Despite his old age, every time he returns home, Mr. Dinh insists on going with his son to the headquarters of the Party Committee, People's Council, and People's Committee of Hoang Dieu commune to visit the officials and ask about the current situation of the commune. Mr. Dinh takes care of the commune health station little by little.

PHAM TUYET