PLA hero injured by mine is discharged

The Southwest Hospital of Army Medical University announced recently that a heroic soldier — Du Fuguo — had been discharged from hospital after three years of therapy in Chongqing. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The Southwest Hospital of Army Medical University announced recently that a heroic soldier— Du Fuguo — who was injured during land mine clearing operations, had been discharged from the hospital after completing three years of therapy in Chongqing.

Du, born in Guizhou province in 1991, deactivated land mines for the People's Liberation Army. The dauntless soldier lost his eyesight and both hands trying to protect his fellow soldiers from a land mine explosion during a clearing operation in Yunnan province in October 2018.

The Southwest Hospital of Army Medical University announced recently that a heroic soldier — Du Fuguo — had been discharged from hospital after three years of therapy in Chongqing. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]
In the three years before the accident, he had entered minefields more than 1,000 times on the country's borders, removed more than 2,400 bombs and handled more than 20 emergencies.

He garnered multiple honors, including "Role Model of Our Times", awarded by the Publicity Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in 2019, and "Heroic Demining Soldier", awarded by the Central Military Commission of China the same year.

"Even if there is a slim chance, we will try our best to help the hero recover," said Liu Hongliang, director of the rehabilitation department in Southwest Hospital of AMU.

Three years ago, Du was sent to the hospital for rehabilitation treatment. A treatment team of 15 medical experts from the hospital's respiratory, cardiology, anesthesiology and laryngology departments was formed.

"Du had multiple serious injuries including explosive injury, total blindness of both eyes, amputation of both forearms, perforation of two eardrums, partial hearing damage and concussion," Liu said.

The treatment team made a daily rehabilitation training plan to improve Du's physical endurance and balance and transformed Du's training equipment and assistive apparatus to enable him to approach normal life sooner.

Du has been recovering well, and is now able to take care of himself in daily activities, such as eating and washing, the hospital said.