Smiles of children just mean happiness for every family.

Pyongyang University of Medical Sciences boasts a woman doctor and educator who has devoted herself for the smiles of children and well-being of families for over 40 years.

“Ensuring well-being is more worthwhile than enjoying it.” This is the view on life of Pak Mi Ra, head of the pediatrics department of the university.

She has adhered to this view, taking care of the well-being of families from her girlhood until now when she is over 60 years old.

“The pediatrics department of our hospital is frequented by many emergency and serious cases including those whose diseases cannot be easily diagnosed and treated. Whenever I see children leaving the hospital cheerfully together with their parents, I think of the department’s head Pak Mi Ra before anyone else,” said Choe Myong Hwan, director of the Pyongyang University of Medical Sciences Hospital.

She has restored countless children to life during her 40-year-long career as pediatric lecturer and head of the university’s pediatrics department.

She regards children as not only patients but also her own.

“Children are all afraid of doctors in uniform. However, the children who are hospitalized as patients of our department follow her, calling her as grandmother,” said Rim Kil Man, a pediatrician of the university hospital.

Even the children who were crying refusing to get injected stop crying at the sight of her and follow her instruction and this shows how affectionately she takes care of children, he added.

The following tells why she shows parental concern for children.

In autumn 1993 she went to an island village as a member of a medical team to treat residents.

One day, after being told that there was an emergency case in a house, she rushed there to find a nine-month-old baby unconscious with its tongue bending inwardly. She gave a transfusion of her own blood to the baby and was awake all night for first aid treatment of it, thus bringing it back to life.

Besides, she donated her skin for burnt children in the village.

After coming to know that the pediatric doctor, who had restored their children to health by dedicating her blood and skin, was a mother with a baby, the villagers admired her for her sincerity as she had come to the village with her child left in the care of her parents.

“When I was about to leave the island, the residents accompanied me to the seaside, expressing their thanks to me for my efforts to provide their families with smiles. Seeing them, I realized how precious the smiles of children are for families and determined to devote my whole life to protecting the well-being of families,” Pak Mi Ra recalled.

True to her determination, she strived to fully display warm humanity and improve her ability. In the course of this she was promoted to head of the pediatrics department of the university and became an authority in the field while consecutively filling such posts as chairwoman of the pediatric society under the Central Committee of the Medical Association of Korea and vice chairwoman of the deliberation committee of the pediatric and gynaecological panel of the State Commission for Conferment of Academic Degrees and Titles.

A doctor and educator, she tells her students that everyone has their childhood and that that is why pediatric doctors have to work with greater sincerity than anybody else from the point of view that they are responsible for the future of the country and raise their ability.

She wrote over 30 textbooks, books and manuals on pediatrics, presented over 50 research papers and received over 50 certificates of registration of educational and scientific achievements, registration of new teaching methods and invention and contrivance for the past 40-odd years.

Meanwhile, she trained many to be October 8 model lecturers, academic degree and title holders and capable pediatric experts.