29th Issue July - September 2020 to the benefit of mankind The First page

In this period of time, there are many events happened that would lead our country into a social crisis, no matter of the COVID-19, drought, and different political views. I would like to tell Siriraj people to think and analyze carefully before making any decision.

I would like to recall the HM the late King ’s words of wisdom which taught us that all decisions should be based on your ethics and values. One should always consider the ethical implications of every decision.

A wise person without virtue and morality will misuse the knowledge and will lead the nation into chaos.

Prof. Dr. Prasit Watanapa Dean Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital,

Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University

Since 1888 (132 years now)

#252 QS World University #1 University #48 QS Asian University #101-150 by subject Medicine (as of 2020)

WFME-certified undergraduate program since 2015 10 postgraduate programs (2019) Advanced HA accreditation since 2014, JCI (SiPH) (2017) Thailand Quality Class award (2017) 4,300+ students, 160+ international students, 927 staffs, 4 Bachelor degrees, 28 Master & Doctorate degree programs, 28 Residency training programs, 106 Sub-specialty & Fellowship training programs, 7 Dual Doctorate degree programs, 2 Joint Doctorate degree programs

13 research centers, 700+ publications / yr, citation index = 6.05 AAHARP-certified since 2014

3.2 m OPD cases / yr; 85,000+ IPD cases / yr 2,054 beds, 114 general wards, 69 OR, 16 I.C.U., case mix index = 2.96

International Relations Division, No. 2, Wang Lang Road, Noi, Bangkok, Thailand 10700 Tel. : +66 2419 9465 Fax : +66 2418 1621 E-mail : [email protected] irsiriraj @SirirajR irsiriraj Website : www2.si.mahidol.ac.th/en The 9th ASEAN Medical Deans’ Summit Virtual Conference

On September 11th - 12th, 2020, Professor Dr. Prasit Watanapa, Dean of Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, along with Siriraj’s Administrative Members, attended the 9th ASEAN Medical Deans’ Summit (9th AMDS) hosted by the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, Thailand. This year, the conference was presented in a “ZOOM” online meeting platform and focused on the theme “COVID-19: Challenge and Lesson Learned with a Focus on Education”.

The 9th AMDS was presided and welcoming remark by Prof. Dr. dr. Ari Fahrial Syam, the President of ASEAN Network from the Faculty of Medicine Universitas Indonesia. The topics and the presentations in the 9th AMDS will be delivered by renowned professors and speakers from the institute’s members of the ASEAN Medical School Network, including from Peking University Health Science Center, and Peking Union Medical College, from China.

On this occasion, the ASEAN Medical Dean Summit has appointed Prof. Chong Yap Seng, Dean of Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore (NUS) to serve as the new President of ASEAN Medical School Network. Prof. Seng stated his intention to establish the global classroom program and multicenter research in the near future.

Watch online Siriraj International Conference in Medicine and Public Health 2020 Webinar Series

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On August 4th, 2020, Prof. Dr. Prasit Watanapa, Dean of Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital presided over the International Conference, SICMPH2020 by delivering the first chapter on Healthcare Collaboration for Aged Society: The First Chapter together with Assoc. Prof. Teera Kolladarungkri, Director of the Golden Jubilee Medical Center, broadcasting via Siriraj Conference​ Facebook Fanpage.

The webinar series conference will present another 12 episodes in every month from now, interested participants can check the schedule of all topics and watch online by the QR Code on your right hand side.

Watch online Siriraj Tenure Club For English & Research Development

On July 31st, 2020, Prof. Dr. Prasit Watanapa, Dean of Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital together with the Board of Siriraj Medical School, attended the opening ceremony of Siriraj Tenure Club at SiMR Auditorium, 12th floor. The ‘Siriraj Tenure Club’ is a collaborated project among Academic Affairs Division, Human Resource Division, Research Division, and International Relations Division to prepare and enhance research and English communication skill for Faculty’s instructors who pursue higher studies abroad.

The 50th APAN Meeting in Minimally Invasive Surgery

On August 3rd, 2020, Prof. Thawatchai Akaraviputh, Deputy Dean of Administration presided over the webinar teleconference the 50th APAN Meeting in MIS broadcasted via ZOOM application.

Minimally Invasive Surgery is now very popular in the gastrointestinal tract surgery. There are many special instruments that have been developed for a specific procedure such as end staple, hemostasis device, and robotic system. The meeting presented 4 - 5 interesting cases from different MIS centers around the world using special devices, instruments, or a new robotic system. Siriraj Launched SI Drive-Thru Blood Test Service

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Siriraj will launch the “SI Drive-Thru Service” to offer the elderly population, NCD patients the newer way of blood collection. With SI Drive-Thru Service, patients do not need to come into the crowded area in the hospital, instead, using drive-thru service for collecting a blood sample and be able to go home. The SI Drive-Thru’s Benefit is that it takes only 4 minutes to collect specimen from each patient, patients can leave the unit within only 15 minutes. The service will minimize the risk of contacting infectious diseases, provide convenience, and improve the quality of life of the patients.

The Value-Driven Care team led by Assoc. Prof. Cherdchai Nopmaneejumruslers, Vice Director of Siriraj Hospital, Dr. Sichon Luerithiphong, Assistant to Director of Siriraj Hospital, and Dr. Theerawich Likitabhorn, Internship student from Emory Rollins School of Public Health, USA, expected to see 10% reduction of the number of patients in the traditional facility within 3 months.

The “SI Drive-Thru Service” will operate in early September this year 2020!! Siriraj Use Activation of Effector Immune Cells to Combat Cholangiocarcinoma Cell

Cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) remains a serious public health concern in Thailand. The study reported a high number of CCA in the North East of Thailand and posed the highest number in the world - 135 men and 48 women per 100,000 populations. The disease killed 14,000 populations every year because of having uncooked freshwater fish and the evidence implicated the carcinogenic liver fluke in the patients.

The Thesis on “IMPROVEMENT OF DENDRITIC CELL FUNCTIONS ON THE ACTIVATION OF EFFECTOR IMMUNE CELLS AGAINST CHOLANGIOCARCINOMA CELL LINES BY INHIBITION OF IL-10 AND TGF-β RECEPTORS” by Dr. Chutamas Thepmalee, a Ph.D. student from Immunology Program (International program), Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, was counted as the first time in Thailand to use the activation of effector immune cells to combat CCA cell in the laboratory. The contribution of her thesis is remarkably beneficial as it is going to become an option for CCA treatment which is effective and safe when combined with the regular treatment e.g. surgery, radiology, chemotherapy, and precision medicine - those posed a high risk of side effect.

Prof. Dr. Pa-thai Yenchitsomanus, Professor and Director, Consultant to the Deputy Dean for Postgraduate Education, Ex-President, and Consultant to the President of Genetics Society of Thailand, Head of Molecular Medicine Division, and Chutamas’s Thesis Advisory Committee explained that the principle of using the effector immune cells of the patient itself becomes a living drug to cure CCA. The way of treatment is safe for the patient because the immune cells were brought from the patient body and developed by using Molecular and Cellular Biology methods. The modified immune cells will be transferred into the patients’ bodies and act as a living drug to fight Cholangiocarcinoma cells.

Dr. Chutamas presented her thesis in the Outstanding Thesis Competition hosted by the Faculty of Graduate Studies, Mahidol University in the first group of Biological Sciences on July 14th, 2020, and received the “Distinguished Thesis Award 2020”. Precision Medicine The Code Breaker for Better Future

In this issue of Siriraj International Relations News, we are honored to have Prof. Manop Pithukpakorn, the leader of Siriraj Center of Excellence in Precision Medicine to share with us an insightful information of the so called “Precision Medicine” and how the genetic study brings about the success treatment of cancer therapy and many more diseases.

“Precision Medicine is quite a new term but the concept is not that new”, said Prof. Manop. We know in the past for a long time that the patients get ill with certain diseases. It tends to be that once the doctor diagnoses patient with certain conditions, all of the patients, regardless of age, gender, or any background conditions, they tend to receive the same treatments but not all the patients get the similar responses. “So if we can unearth the differences, we could select or we could predict at first which treatment should be appropriate for each patient. And that would generally make the treatment more precise to each patient and that concludes the term we call Precision Medicine” explained Prof. Manop.

Precision Medicine in Thailand is not that far behind from the rest of the world. Thanks to the technology nowadays that allow the researcher to answer all different conditions of many diseases in the past 20 years since the Human Genome Project had been started. “At Siriraj Hospital, we establish SI-CORE which stands for Siriraj Center of Research Excellence to have a primary Professor Manop Pithukpakorn focus on studying the differences in each condition especially cancer and how do we apply those treatment and knowledge into a better Assistant Dean for Research treatment plan and also a prognostic monitoring in those patients” Leader at Siriraj Center of Excellence in Precision Medicine

07 Performances It is also important to talk about genetics in the context of Precision Medicine. In the past, the old idea or the concept said that genetics should focus for the certain rare diseases, familial diseases with a distinct inheritance pattern. But when the HGP has arrived, genetics becomes fundamental knowledge to answer different health conditions or aspect in the human health.“Studying human genetics allow us to decode the human genetic letter, we can understand how do those people respond to certain medication but not others, we can know the difference between the diseases in one person to the others” Obviously, many common conditions like hypertension, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, they always have what they called environmental factors played role.

Focusing on Siriraj Hospital, the Project called “Genome Thailand”, operated by Siriraj Genome Center, has been established for supporting a treatment and a research at Siriraj and expanding the technology and the framework to serve not only for the hospital, but the entire country’s health system. On the service side, the hospital is beginning to welcome patients who would like to utilize this technology on their cancer treatment and prevention. “It’s not only in the university’s hospital system, but also in the Ministry of Public Health system. We have established a lot of collaboration to other countries, also patients who have interest in trying to contribute that knowledge that will be beneficial to Thai patients in the future.”, explained Prof. Manop.

Genetics & Precision Medicine will be an auxiliary factor that would elevate the standard of the health care system for the Thai and foreign patients to have a higher standard of treatment especially in the complex condition like cancer, cardiovascular diseases, or other complex diseases. With these, we offer the world-class technologies, but we also manage to control the cost of the treatment. So the patient could access to and afford those technologies at the same time as they have the similar standard. “ The passion could be at the beginning, but to fulfill your engine to go to the end, you will need purpose.”

Watch full interview The GA²LEN | HAEi Angioedema Centers of Reference and Excellence (ACARE and ADCARE)

Angioedema is a common condition, affecting to patients’ quality of life. Since it is a difficult-to-treat condition, the treatment is still challenging to the physicians. Prof. Kanokvalai Kulthanan has established Siriraj Urticaria Clinic at Department of Dermatology, Siriraj Hospital since 2001 to focus on providing the best diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to the patients with urticaria and also angioedema by dedicated multidisciplinary teams. Our teams have been consistently studying on many researches to improve knowledge and management of angioedema as shown in many published high-quality articles.

In 2020, Siriraj Urticaria Clinic, Department of Dermatology, Siriraj Hospital has been certified as the first Global Allergy and Asthma European Network (GA2LEN)/HAE international (HAEi) Angioedema Centers of Reference and Excellence (ACARE) in Southeast Asia and promoted to be Siriraj Urticaria and Angioedema center. The clinic is willing to provide excellence in angioedema management, encourage and support researches in the field of angioedema as well as promote awareness towards angioedema through advocacy activities.

Professor Kanokvalai Kulthanan

Head of Siriraj Urticaria Center SiCORE-CIT’s Research Published In ELSEVIER

Ms. Thanich Sangsuwannukul Prof. Dr. Pa-thai Yenchitsomanus First Author Corresponding Author

The original research paper from Siriraj Center of Research Excellence for Cancer Immunotherapy (SiCORE-CIT) entitled “Anti-Tumour Effect of the Fourth-Generation Chimeric Antigen Receptor T Cells Targeting CD133 Against Cholangiocarcinoma Cells” by Ms. Thanich Sangsuwannukul (First Author) and Prof. Dr. Pa-thai Yenchitsomanus (Corresponding Author) was accepted to be published in ELSEVIER’s International Immunopharmacology!

The “International Immunopharmacology” is the primary publication of original research papers pertinent to the overlapping areas of immunology, pharmacology, cytokine biology, immunotherapy, immunopathology, and immunotoxicology.

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Online abstract available here! Siriraj Won Two Awards of “Public Sector Excellence Award 2020”

September 16th, 2020, Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, won two awards of the “Public Sector Excellence Award (Lert-Rat) 2020” from the Office of the Public Sector Development Commission (OPDC). The first award,“Excellent Services Innovation Award” goes to Prof. Pornprom Muangman, Assistant Dean of Administration, on his innovation “Siriraj Polyester Containing Herbal Extract Dressings (Si-HERB): The Latest Innovation in Burn Wound Healing”, and the second award, “Good Services Development Award” goes to Assoc. Prof. Ubolrat Santawat, Deputy Dean of Finance and Clin. Prof. Adune Ratanawichitrasin, Deputy Dean of Information Technology, for the project “Siriraj’s e-Receipt System Development”. Siriraj Won “DMSc Awards 2020”

August 26th, 2020, Assoc. Prof. Aasis Unnanuntana from Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, won the award “DMSc Awards 2020” from Department of Medical Sciences, Ministry of Public Health, Thailand, in the category of Medical Science Books/Textbooks on his author “Textbook of Hip Fracture in The Elderly”.

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September 30th, 2020, ConnecTechAsia – Asia’s leading Infocomm Media and Technology, announced the winners for the “1st CommunicAsia Awards” to celebrate the advancement and excellence across the global ecosystem service provider in their endeavour to build next- generation networks that will form the backbone of future societies. The CommunicAsia Awards will feature eight categories to showcase innovation in telecoms trials, developments, automation technology, core network technologies, and more. The award in the category of “Most Innovative 5G Trial in Asia Pacific Region (APAC)” goes to the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University for their implementation of 5G to build a secure, reliable, and smart 5G Hospital in Thailand. CommunicAsia Awards 2020 has more than 6,800 attendees participated in the first fully virtual iteration of the event that featured 200 conference sessions, more than 280 speakers, and 323 exhibitors. ConnecTechAsia also expanded its content to include new shows, conferences, competitions, and award ceremonies. One of the highlights of the event, the inaugural CommunicAsia Awards, recognized innovation and achievement across global service providers. The virtual award ceremony was held on September 30th, 2020. Congratulations Siriraj! Siriraj Won Museum Thailand Awards 2020

Siriraj Bimuksthan Museum was awarded “Museum Thailand Awards 2020” in a category of “Science and Environment Museum - focuses on Communication and Experience (Medicine and Public Health)”. The award was well received by Assoc. Prof. Tumtip Sangruchi, Director of Siriraj Museum on behalf of the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University. Siriraj Faculty Appointed as WFSA Committee for Pain Management

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Congratulations to Asst. Prof. Nantthasorn Zinboonyahgoon, Head of Siriraj Pain Management Clinical Training Center on appointed as the Pain Management Committee of the World Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists (WFSA) starting from July 16th, 2020.

The World Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists (WFSA) is a unique, global network of National Societies that brings together qualified practitioners of this specialized area of medicine. As an essential element of any safe and pain-free surgical intervention, anesthesiology is a major contributor to positive health outcomes. The WFSA works to make safe anesthesia universally accessible and to improve patient care around the world. Asst. Prof. Nantthasorn Zinboonyahgoon positioned at the WFSA will promote Pain Medicine of Thailand and leverage the training capability of Siriraj Pain Management Clinical Training Center at the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital. Mark Your Calendar

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