Dr. Kim was born in 1962 in Busan, South Korea. He graduated from Pusan National University College of Medicine in 1986. He was trained at the Department of Surgery of Dong-A University Hospital in Busan for his residency and fellowship program between 1989 and 1996. He also received a Ph.D. from Dong-A University. From 1998 to Feb. 2003, he worked for Dong-A University Hospital and Dong-A University College of Medicine as full-time faculty. During his tenure at Dong-A University Hospital, he contributed significantly to developing and stabilizing laparoscopic surgery and faithfully performed the role of a pioneer of laparoscopic surgery. He succeeded in laparoscopic gastric surgery for gastric ulcer patients in 1996 and then expanded the indications for laparoscopic gastrectomy to gastric cancer patients and first established a stable program in Korea. Therefore, he is considered the pioneer and stabilizer of laparoscopic gastrectomy in Korea.
Dr. Kim’s leadership roles further demonstrate his expertise and influence in the field. In 2003, he became a founding member of the department of surgery at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital. Since 2009, he has served as a professor at the department of surgery, Seoul National University College of Medicine. His leadership skills were recognized when he was appointed as the chairman of the department of surgery, Seoul National University Bundang Hospital between 2012 and 2016. He was the director of the Comprehensive Cancer Center and chairman of development support at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital.
He is a pioneer in minimally invasive surgery of gastric cancer treatment in Korea. He started to perform laparoscopic gastrectomy in 1996 and achieved 500 laparoscopic gastrectomies in 2006, which was the first in the world. His unit was one of the biggest minimally invasive gastric cancer surgery centers in the world. His team reported 3000 cases of laparoscopic gastrectomy in 2014 with lower morbidity and higher survival rates than historical reports. At 2020, his team achieved a total of 10,000 gastrectomies, including 8,000 cases of laparoscopic gastrectomy. His team is popular for performing several onsite and tele-live surgeries of laparoscopic gastrectomy for international and regional scientific meetings.
He is one of the Korean Laparoscopic Gastrointestinal Surgery Study Group (KLASS) foundation members established in 2004. He was the president of KLASS from 2012 to 2015. Above all, he successfully conducted the study as the principal investigator of KLASS-01, a phase 3 study comparing laparoscopic gastrectomy and conventional open surgery in clinical stage 1 patients. This KLASS -01 study played an important role in confirming the scientific justification of laparoscopic surgery for gastric cancer and leading the revision of treatment guidelines. He has been conducting many clinical trials to evaluate the role of MIS for gastric cancer, including sentinel navigation surgery, image-guided surgery, and function-preserving proximal gastrectomy with double tract reconstruction and making progress in various translation research. He is president of the Korean Society of Peritoneal Surface Malignancies. He has just begun another academic journey. We have begun another uncharted journey, the treatment of peritoneal cancer. He is recognized as the world’s leading authority in MIS for gastric cancer.
