| Slowly but steadily, the stigma attached to people with disabilities decreased. / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul |
By Jung Min-ho, Kim Eil-chul
As a young man, Park Chang-il never doubted his future as an orthopedic surgeon.
He never planned to succeed his medical school professor Shin Jung-soon, who later became known as Korea's "father of physical medicine and rehabilitation."
"When he asked me to work for the future of Korea's physical medicine and rehabilitation, I did not even know what that field meant exactly. In the early 1980s, very few did," said Park, now 68 and director of Konyang University Hospital in Daejeon.
Physical medicine and rehabilitation, also known as physiatry or rehabilitation medicine, is a branch of medicine that aims to improve and restore functional ability and quality of life of those with physical impairments or disabilities.
"At that time, rehabilitation medicine was barely known and there were few rehabilitation specialists in Korea," Park said.
He eventually decided to change his career path and went to Germany to study the field. When he returned to Yonsei University in 1987, the nation's first rehabilitation hospital on the campus was just completed.
"For the next five years, there was never a day when I had enough sleep," he said. "The 150-bed hospital soon became packed with patients and, for a while, I was one of the very few specialists there. Taking care of patients, teaching students and still learning about my field, I was overwhelmed with work."
However, he said, the most difficult part was the struggle to promote rehabilitation medicine as a medical specialty. Yonsei had set up a department to nurture specialists in the field. Yet, rehabilitation medicine remained relatively unknown among Korean doctors.
| Park Chang-il, director of Konyang University Hospital in Daejeon, treats a patient. He is one of the pioneers of rehabilitative treatment in Korea. / Courtesy of Konyang University Hospital |
"Many patients with permanent physical damage were simply left in hospital beds or advised to go home," Park said. "So I asked doctors in the other divisions to send them to me."
After being treated by Park, many patients showed clear signs of recovery. "Some could walk independently again, and some could do more things by themselves despite their limited abilities," he said.
With the obvious changes in the patients once considered as untreatable, many doctors started to take rehabilitation medicine more seriously, he said.
That's when Park began educating doctors across the country about cerebral palsy, a group of permanent movement disorders that appear in early childhood. There is no cure for it, but its symptoms may be alleviated with early detection and therapy.
"It was one of the diseases that were largely neglected at that time because of a lack of understanding. I told them that rehabilitation medicine could help patients," he said.
The focus of rehabilitation medicine is not the full restoration of pre-morbid functions, but rather the optimization of the quality of life of those whose functions cannot be fully restored, he noted.
Chronic pain management is another part of the field, and can be achieved through a multidisciplinary approach involving psychology experts and exercise therapists.
Under his guidance, rehabilitation medicine soon became widely known in the country. However, Park also realized that physical disabilities aren't the only reason keeping the patients inside their homes.
Living in the shadows
According to the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the number of registered disabled people stands at 2.4 million, or about 5 percent of the nation's total population.
"But we don't see them often. Why? Because the lack of infrastructure prevents them from leaving their homes on their own. In addition, they face stigma, negative attitudes and discrimination in our society," Park said.
"And it was even worse 30 years ago."
In fact, Korean society at that time was not accommodating to those with disabilities. There were too many stairs and almost no automatic doors.
Many restaurants, cafes and taxis didn't treat them properly as guests. There was a pervasive myth that people with disabilities bring bad luck.
"In fear of the stigma, parents tried to hide their disabled children and never talked about them. Discrimination against them was everywhere," Park said. "It was extremely rare to see someone in a wheelchair on the streets."
Such prejudice led many people with disabilities to conceal their conditions and avoid seeking help.
"Sometimes I felt like everything I'd done for them was in vain. After months or years of therapy, many thought they finally earned a second chance at life, as they could drive a car and move around in a wheelchair. But practically, they were not allowed to, because of the stigma," Park said.
He believed broader changes in people's perceptions were necessary. So he started getting more involved in the promotion of equal rights for people with disabilities.
As the team doctor, he participated in the 1988 Seoul Paralympics with the Korean athletes. Since then, he has attended every Paralympics either as the team doctor or as a medical adviser.
He also raised fund for athletes with disabilities, and used the money to make associations of ice sledge hockey, wheelchair tennis and many other sports.
"Slowly but steadily, the stigma attached to people with disabilities decreased," he said.
His campaign for disabled people's equal rights continues. He thinks there are many more things to be done.
Despite the progress that Park has achieved, Korea remains far behind most developed countries in terms of the rights of people with disabilities.
Korea's disability discrimination act went into effect just seven years ago. The law bars public and private firms from discriminating against people with disabilities, whether they are employees or customers. But critics have pointed out that some of the clauses are confusing and vague.
"The campaign must continue," Park said.
International cooperation
For Park, cooperation with specialists in other countries has always been essential because of the short history of rehabilitation medicine and the lack of specialists in Korea three decades ago.
"I participated in as many international conferences as I could and built close relationships with as many foreign physiatrists as I could," he said. "Yet the news in 2006 that I was selected as the president of the International Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine (ISPRM) was unexpected. I was surprised."
The year after he began his term, the 4th World Congress of the ISPRM was held in Seoul, with more than 2,500 participants from 75 countries.
"It is considered one of the best events of the organization," he said. "Many told me that they were very impressed by the fast development of rehabilitation medicine in Korea."
Today, Korea has more than 1,600 rehabilitation medicine specialists.