On last March 26th, the Ministry of Health and Welfare designated Gil Hospital of Gachon University as one of the ten research-focused hospitals after deliberation by the Healthcare Information Technology Policy Council. That means it is a hospital that makes profit through doctors and researchers developing cutting edge medical machine, technology, medicine, cures etc., based on knowledge accumulated from experience with patients. It also means that it is a leading global hospital contributing to the development of the health industry through those activities. Unlike other hospitals, the research-focused hospital has a system that manages to find a balance between treatment and research. Also, many of the hospital members handle their own research tasks. Once a hospital is designated as a research-focused hospital, it is provided with institutional support, which means they can pay personnel expenses to researchers and use funds for research development.
  Gachon University’s Gil hospital put an emphasis on metabolic diseases such as diabetes, and obesity and on senile disease including strokes and senile dementia. Centered on Gachon Biomedical Research Institute, the plan is to establish technology at a world level in those two areas and to construct a dielectric med-cluster, which is a medical complex, to open a dielectric medicine research institute in 2014. Special emphasis is on managing Gachon Brain Health Center and Lee Gil Ya Cancer and Diabetes Institute to the world’s level, then arranging a joint research system. In addition, it is planned to set up a Gachon medical-science research center for general research manpower training. It is expected to be fully realized through a fusion of existing facilities at Gachon University and Gil hospital, such as medical science, oriental medicine, pharmacy and eubiotics. The plan is to industrialize and create a public management system in which academic-industrial cooperation will be operated without constraints, in order to lead all the research establishment and research training to actual profit making. Then the industrialization using the Bio Research Complex (BRC) in Songdo International City will be available. 
  These plans of Gil Hospital seem to be highly evaluated as they are realizable and concrete ones. The hospital already runs a special treatment program for dementia and Parkinson’s disease, also leading the research and treatment of brain disease by operating Dementia Management Team in the city of Incheon. Research of strokes utilizing MRI is especially active, and a diabetes incretion center on a national scale is operated for metabolic diseases. Numerous institutes run by Gil hospital are already ranked as global-class research institutes thanks to the innovative investment.
  By being designated as one of the research-focused hospitals, research at each affiliated institute becomes more active, and the bio research complex business (BRC) in Songdo International City is also expected to gather momentum. In addition, Gil hospital’s cancer center, which is located in Incheon, is selected as a cancer-research hospital that represents the region.   As it is also chosen as an emergency center of the Western Sea, emergency patients of the western sea are transported to Gil hospital. In that process, a doctor helicopter—a helicopter with emergency medical equipment---is being used for transportation, and only two hospitals including Gil hospital are approved for doctor helicopters by the Ministry of Health and Welfare. As such, the growth of Gil Hospital of Gachon University is much anticipated by both government and region.