The nation's first '12AM treatment' children's hospital, it started because of this person

‘Pain’ doesn’t wait for time. That’s why there is a ‘golden time’ for every incident, accident, and disease.

So, when my family gets sick, I get anxious. Moreover, if a child gets sick in the middle of the night, the parents want to rush to the emergency room right away, but the cost is also burdensome.

In Gwangju Metropolitan City, there is a ‘Public Late-Night Children’s Hospital’ that is open 365 days a year, taking into account the feelings of such parents and operating at a lower cost than emergency room fees, until midnight, without worrying about ‘open runs’.

Since its opening in September 2023, the number of citizens who have visited this hospital has been around 60,000, which has had the significant effect of relieving emergency room overcrowding and reducing household financial burden by about 2 billion won.

There was a public official who worked tirelessly to achieve these results. Jang Myeong-hwa, the head of the pharmaceutical management team at the Public Health and Medical Services Division of Gwangju Metropolitan City, played a pivotal role in starting the operation of the public late-night children’s hospital.

Accordingly, Team Leader Jang was selected as the 4th Active Administrative Meritorious Person in July and received the highest award, the ‘Green Stripe Order of Civil Merit’, and he is still receiving phone calls of encouragement and support from many citizens.

Team Leader Jang has been working in public service for over 30 years, working on health, medical, infectious disease, etc., and is a ‘veteran’ in the health sector, currently in charge of pharmaceutical management.

It is only natural that he would notice the reality of citizens enduring inconvenience due to the lack of children’s hospitals that operate late at night.

In particular, at the time, there was no ‘Moonlight Children’s Hospital’ in Gwangju Metropolitan City that operated until 11 PM on weekdays and 6 PM on weekends and holidays under the leadership of the government, so local media continuously raised this issue.

Accordingly, Team Leader Jang decided that he had to resolve the absence of Moonlight Children’s Hospital and, furthermore, establish a late-night children’s hospital in the region that operates longer than Moonlight Children’s Hospital’s operating hours.

However, it was not smooth sailing from the start. First, the hospital medical staff in charge of the operation showed reluctance, and the city also had financial difficulties in starting it independently with its own budget without government support.

First, in the case of the medical staff, there were not many pediatric specialists working at the hospital, and the personnel expenses were low compared to the general treatment costs for pediatric patients, and it was burdensome to provide treatment until late at night.

Knowing this reality, the city was skeptical about whether there would be hospitals or medical staff willing to step forward, but urged itself, saying, “If we are going to push ahead, don’t we need to operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?”

From then on, Team Leader Jang went back and forth to general hospitals, children’s hospitals, and city councils to persuade them dozens of times, and finally secured the first budget of 1.5 billion won for medical staff nighttime treatment allowances, and announced the start of a late-night children’s hospital that operates until midnight, 365 days a year.

Afterwards, through a public contest, Gwangju Christian Hospital was finally designated as the first public late-night children’s hospital, and operations began with an investment of 2.3 billion won from September 2023 to December 2025.

When the ‘Public Late-Night Children’s Hospital’ began operation in Gwangju Metropolitan City, where there was no Moonlight Children’s Hospital, the media was the first to take interest.

Team Leader Jang said, “We did distribute a few press releases at first, but the media showed a lot of interest first,” and “At that time, if you typed ‘public late-night children’s hospital’ into the search bar, about 100 articles came up.”

He continued, “Given the response, citizens have already found out about it through the media even without the city doing any special promotion,” adding, “This shows how much Gwangju citizens have been waiting for the late-night children’s hospital.”

There were also many encouraging phone calls from citizens, such as, “How did you come up with this idea?”, “I’m so glad that a public late-night children’s hospital has opened in Gwangju now,” and “As a parent, I’m so grateful.”

However, Team Leader Jang expressed regret, saying, “Due to budgetary issues, only one public late-night children’s hospital has started operating in Nam-gu,” and “It was very disappointing to receive phone calls asking us to create a public late-night children’s hospital in our district as well.”

Fortunately, the opening of the public late-night children’s hospital also attracted the government’s attention, and support for the Moonlight Children’s Hospital began in Gwangju Metropolitan City.

Accordingly, Gwangju Central Hospital on Suwan-ro, Gwangsan-gu, which is far from the public late-night children’s hospital, was designated as Moonlight Children’s Hospital.

In addition, Team Leader Jang explained that they are currently pushing forward with designating one Moonlight Children’s Hospital in each district of Gwangju Metropolitan City in the future, and that by opening them sequentially like this, they will be able to operate children’s late-night hospitals in an appropriately balanced manner.

The positive influence of Team Leader Jang, who opened the floodgates for children’s late-night hospitals, is particularly influencing other cities and provinces, and local governments in many places, including Yeosu, are promoting benchmarking through visits and phone inquiries.

Team Leader Jang still has work to do. He said, “First of all, we are doing our best to extend the operation of the public late-night children’s hospital and further expand the designation of the Moonlight Children’s Hospital.”

He also said, “We plan to do our best to establish and strengthen the pediatric medical system by establishing a pediatric emergency medical center that specializes in diagnosing and treating children 24 hours a day and by building a pediatric medical network.”

Team Leader Jang defined proactive administration as “active administrative action for the people, with the people, and reaching out to the people.”

Accordingly, he said, “Valuable policies will spread only when sufficient feasibility conditions are set based on a clear understanding of reality, and when a consensus is formed among the parties involved, implementation plans are prepared and promoted, and the results are actively shared.”

In particular, he said, “I want to emphasize a clear perception of reality,” and asked, “If you misjudge reality, the administration may go backwards, so wouldn’t it be proactive administration to always look around you as well as your own thoughts to find the right path?”

He explained, “In my case, I decided to push forward with this project after carefully considering the opinions of the petitioners along with the thought, ‘What if my child is sick and has no place to go?’”

Meanwhile, Team Leader Jang said, “Some civil servants hesitate to take proactive measures because they think they might just be creating more work for nothing,” and asserted, “If you hesitate and end up not doing something, the success rate is 0%, but if you just make up your mind to take action, the success rate can be close to 100%.”

He continued, “At the very least, doing something rather than doing nothing is helpful not only to the citizens but also to the individual,” and said with a smile, “If you add positivity to positive thinking, you too are already experts in proactive administration.”