Ri Jong Sim, head of the injection preparation department at the Koryo Medicine General Hospital, is an expert in the field of Koryo medicine pharmacology.

Koryo medicines prepared by her are now winning popularity at the curative and preventive medical institutions for their apparent efficacy in clinical practice.

She chose a medical career in research into Koryo medicine, greatly influenced by her parents who were all doctors.

Her father learned about the superiority of Koryo medicine and traditional Koryo medicines in the course of medical treatment and advised his daughter to specialize in Koryo medicine.

After graduating from middle school, Jong Sim had an in-depth understanding of the methods of preparing Koryo medicines while working at a Koryo medicine pharmaceutical factory.

In Juche 92 (2003) she was enrolled at Sariwon College of Koryo Pharmacy and acquired a broad knowledge of Koryo pharmacy. She found that the traditional Koryo medicines have many advantages over those of other countries and, in particular, medicinal herbs in Korea are higher in yield and richer in pharmacological ingredients than those of the same species cultivated in other countries.

After graduating from the college, she became a pharmacist at the Koryo Medicine General Hospital in Juche 96 (2007). She decided to develop Koryo medicines in the form of injection with great therapeutic effect by relying on locally available raw materials.

Most important in making Koryo medicines is to correctly analyze and sort out pharmacological ingredients of medicinal herbs.

Ri Jong Sim set it as a goal to develop a standard Koryo medicine in the form of injection which can be widely used in the field of Koryo medicine, and made painstaking efforts.

She collected traditional drug making methods found in old traditional medical books and handed down among the people and frequently made her way to the forests to find new medicinal herbs.

Being informed of her research project, Kim In Sun, section chief of the Koryo Medicine General Hospital, and other experts on Koryo medicine and prestigious scholars offered selfless assistance to her work.

They unhesitatingly handed over their experiences and research findings to Jong Sim.

Her painstaking efforts of a decade or more bore fruit: She made a qualitative and quantitative analysis of protocatechuic aldehyde, a pharmacological ingredient in Salvia miltiorrhiza , and standardized its model product for the first time in the country and developed a Salvia miltiorrhiza and safflower injection which is efficacious for the treatment of ischemic heart disease by using safflower.

She also discovered a method of removing protein, tannin, etc. which had long been a knotty problem in making Koryo medicines in the form of injection, completed a cheap and safe preparation method of it and developed various kinds of medicines one after another.

The Koryo Medicine General Hospital widely uses new Koryo medicines developed by applying the unique drug making method completed by Ri Jong Sim. And they reportedly prove highly effective in the treatment of such cardiovascular diseases as hypertension, myocardial infarction and cerebral thrombosis.

Now, Koryo medicine preparation methods developed by Ri Jong Sim have been introduced into various curative and preventive medical institutions and pharmaceutical factories.

Ri Maek