Introduction of the department /

All the members of this department have been trained at Taipei Veterans General Hospital and equipped with specialist or secondary specialist qualifications. They have profound clinical knowledge and skills to deal with various acute and chronic diseases commonly seen in internal medicine, including hepatology and gastroenterology, neurology, cardiology, pulmonary medicine, emergency medicine, family medicine, and pediatrics. Easy access to a superior team allows the people in the Yilan area to have their medical problems attended to by our professional, dedicated, and responsible medical staff. With these merits, their problems could be solved without the need of long trips into Taipei.

Personnel and facilities /
•A strong staff array：
 

◎Chief of internal medicine: Physician: "Chu Zheng-Wei"
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Defense Medical Center.
Specialty physician of the Taiwan Society of Internal Medicine
Specialty physician of the Gastroenterological Society of Taiwan
Specialty physician of the Digestive Endoscope Society of Taiwan
Attending physician of gastroenterology of Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Clinic researcher of gastroenterology of Taipei Veterans General Hospital.
◎Services include: maldigestion, gastritis, stomach and duodenal ulcer, hematemesis, abdominal distention and pain, constipation, diarrhea, acute and chronic hepatitis, jaundice, liver fat, hepatic cirrhosis, ascots, cholecystitis, gallstones, liver stones, pancreatitis, peptic tumors, and liver tumors. 

◎Chief of neurology：*Physician : Chou Qi-Xiang
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, College of Medicine, Chugn Gung University
Specialty physician of Taiwan Neurological Society
Specialty physician of neurology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Contracted attending physician of Neurology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Concurrent clinic assistant at National Defense Medical Center.
A member of the Taiwan Headache Society
Participating in the "PhD program" of the Institute of Clinical Medicine, National Yang-Ming University
◎Services included：General internal medical diseases, headache and giddiness, stroke, epilepsy, sciatica, myasthenia, Parkinson's disease, sore waist and aching back, limb numbness, facial spasms, muscular dystrophy, and muscular neuropathy, etc.

◎Group of attending physicians
◎* Physician： Hsu Kuo-Chou
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Specialty physician of Taiwan Neurological Society
Specialty physician of neurology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Concurrent clinical assistant at National Defense Medical Center
◎Services include： General internal medicine diseases, headache and giddiness, stroke, epilepsy, sciatica, myasthenia, Parkinson's disease, sore waist and aching back, limb numbness, facial spasm, muscular dystrophy, and muscular neuropathy, etc.

  ◎* Physician : Lin Fang-Chi
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science,Chung Shan Medical University
Specialty physician of Taiwan Society of Internal Medicine
Specialty physician of Taiwan Society of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine
Resident of pulmonary medicine and chief physician, Taipei Veterans General Hospital,
Concurrent lecturer of the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Participated in the "PhD Program" of the Institute of Clinical Medicine, National Yang-Ming University
◎Services included： Cold, cough, hemoptysis, asthma, dyspuea, tuberculosis, emphysema, pneumonia, chest pain, removal of foreign bodies from respiratory tract, and lung diseases, such as bronchitis and bronchiectasis.

  ◎* Physician : Lee Wei-Ru
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Specialty physician of theTaiwan Association of Family Medicine
A member of the Taiwan Academy of Hospice Palliative Medicine
A member of the Gerontological Society of Taiwan
A member of the Taiwanese Association of Diabetes Educators
Accredited physician of the Taipei City Depression Collaborative Care System
Attending physician of family medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Taskforce guidance advisor of the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Passed the senior examination for civil service physicians.

 ◎* Physician : Lu Hsin-Bang
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Defense Medical Center
Lecturer for the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Participated in the "PhD program" of the Institute of Clinical Medicine, National Yang-Ming University
Attending physician of cardiology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Deputy Secretary General of the Society of Lipids and Atherosclerosis
Associate editor of Clinical Medical Magazine, published by Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Assistant editor of magazines published by Taiwan Society of Cardiology
Clinical lecturer for the Department of Medical Science, National Defense Medical Center
Passed the physician examination for specialty occupations and technicians
Passed the senior examination for civil-service physicians as classified in the medical system.
Passed the specialty physician examination held by Taiwan Society of Internal Medicine
Passed the specialty physician examination held by Taiwan Society of Cardiology

◎* Physician : Lai Zi-Xian
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, Taipei Medical University
Specialty physician of the Taiwan Neurological Association
Specialty physician of neurology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Contract attending physician of neurology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Concurrent clinical assistant of the National Defense Medical Center
A member of the Taiwan Neurological Society
A member of the Taiwan Headache Society
◎Services include: Headache and giddiness, stoke, dementia (Alzheimer's disease), sciatica, Parkinson's disease, epilepsy, myasthenia, various kinds of neuralgia and nerve paralysis, sore waist and aching back, limb numbness, muscular dystrophy, and general internal medicine diseases.

 ◎*Physician : Chen Ting-Chang
Graduated from the Department of Medical Science, National Yang-Ming University
Specialty physician of the Endocrine Society of the Republic of China
Specialty physician of the Taiwan Society of Internal Medicine
Resident of the metabolism of internal medicine and chief physician, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Contracted attending physician of the metabolism of internal medicine, Taipei Veterans General Hospital
Accredited physician of the Lanyang Diabetes Care System
A member of the Taiwanese Association of Diabetes Educators
A member of the Taiwan Medical Association for the Study of Obesity
◎Services include："Metabolic syndrome: - diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, high uric acid level, and obesity, etc." Endocrine diseases" - pituitary gland, (deficient growth hormone, acromegaly, prolactinoma, Cushing's disease), thyroid gland (bronchocele, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism, thyroiditis), adrenal gland (secondary hypertension, adrenal gland tumors, hypoadrenocorticism), menstrual irregularity, osteoporosis, etc.
◎Specialty nurses:： Nurse Tsao Li-Yin, Lai Bi-Xiang, Tu Yue-Yu, Jien Yu-Mei and Chang Yue.
◎Laboratorians and technicians： Section chief Hsia Yu-Wen, and Lee Yuan-Yao, Chu Rei-Ding, Fu Shi-Gao, and Liao Yu-Yin

Services include /
　　Diseases commonly seen in a family (e.g. cold, diarrhea, musculoskeletal injuries), various chronic diseases, prevention and health care consultation, diabetes, hypercholesterolemia (muddy blood), hypertension, hyperuricalcidemia (gout), common occupational injuries, general skin diseases.
Specializing in： Family medicine, prevention and health care, various types of health examinations, various chronic diseases, diabetes, hypertension, irregular blood lipids, asthma, cold.

Key developments /
Gastroenterology
1. To set up specialty examination rooms, and add related facilities, such as digestive tract endoscope and abdominal echo, to service greater numbers of people.
2. To reinforce the diagnosis, treatment and periodic tracing of liver diseases, such as virus hepatitis and alcoholic hepatitis.
3. To fulfill the prevention of type A & B hepatitis.
4. Early diagnosis and treatment of hepatic cirrhosis and liver cancer
5. Treatment of bleeding of the upper and lower gastro intestinal track, and polyp removal.
6. To cooperate with surgery and radiology to enhance the treatment of hepatological diseases
7. Anthrax helicobacter pylori testing.

Neurology
1. Dementia (To assign exclusive personnel to track and examine patients)
2. Cerebrovascular diseases (To form a cerebrovascular disease ward)
3. Headache – Currently working with the Taiwan Veterans General Hospital on an integrated research project, exclusive personnel have been assigned to track patients’ progress to strengthen service quality.
4. epilepsy

Pulmonary Medicine
1. To establish 16 RCWs (Respiratory Care Wards) in order to better service those patients using respirators.
2. To set up a specialty examination rooms and put in other related facilities, such as bronchoscope, chest echo, and pulmonary function testing, in order to service greater numbers of people.
3. To reinforce asthma patients’ health education, so as to reduce their seizure frequency and avoid waste of medical resources.
4. To cooperate with radiology to elevate the diagnosis rate of chronic lung diseases and lung tumors in the Yilan area.

Cardiology
1. To set up specialty examination rooms and add related facilities, such as heart echo, around-the-clock electrocardiogram, in order to service greater numbers of people
2. To prevent and cure arrhythmia
3. To enhance people's awareness of the risk factors of coronary heart diseases, including hyperlipidemia, hypertension, and diabetes, etc., and aggressively work on prevention tasks.
4. To establish an integrated referral system (to collaborate with Taipei Veterans General Hospital)

Emergency medicine
1. To cooperate with the hospitals in the Yilan area, to complete an intact county medical emergency rescue system.
2. To follow the Health Bureau's policy of establishing a regional disaster rescue team working with emergency medical rescue.
3. With the establishment of the new Yilan downtown outpatient clinic and emergency center, emergency services can be extended to greater numbers of people.
4. In addition to sending our staff to learn advanced first-aid technologies, we also support the training of advanced life saving skills, held either inside or outside of the county by providing technical guidance.

Home medicine
1. Community home care
2. To cultivate a healthy community
3. Travel health and physical examination (in conjunction with Yilan's local customs and practices, we provide travel health consultations and physical examinations)
4. To screen cancer and track patients’ post-treatment recovery status (to cooperate with the Koo Foundation Sun Yat-Sen Cancer Center to nurture frontline physicians for cancer treatment)
5. Terminal cancer patients’ palliative wards
6. Plan to set up some special outpatient services, such as smoking cessation outpatient service, weight-loss special outpatient service, and anti-aging special outpatient service, etc., to service the local people.

Pediatrics
1. To give vaccine shots to infants
2. To reinforce infant health examinations
3. To collaborate with the educational institutes and hospitals in Sibei area to offer health education and hold seminars targeting junior high and grade school students as well as pre-school children in the area.
4. In conjunction with various activities, such as Children's Folklore Festival and Green Exposition, sponsored by Yilan County, we will provide medical services to facilitate tourist safety and quality.