Introduction

As a pioneer of Chinese cardiac surgery, the Cardiac Surgery Department of Zhongshan Hospital was founded in 1947. It is one of the first institutions to grant master and doctoral degrees in China. The department has gained a dozen of pioneering achievements, including development and clinical application of China’s first vertical standing heart-lung machine. It’s a national key clinic department, a national and municipal key discipline, and a quality control center for clinical cardiothoracic surgery in Shanghai. The department is also the Shanghai medical center for clinical cardiovascular diseases, the Shanghai top-priority clinical medical center, a key discipline of the Ministry of Education’s “211 project” and “985 project”, and the training base for minimally invasive techniques in cardiovascular surgery for the Ministry of Health. The Cardiothoracic Surgery Branch of Chinese Medical Association also takes the department as a training base for cardiac surgeons.

With the experience passed down from experts of the last generation, such as Huang Jiasi and Shi Meixin, and under the leadership of Professor Wang Chunsheng, the director, the Cardiac Surgery Department of Zhongshan Hospital has grown into a top cardiac surgery center, one of the top-five departments specialized in the cardiac surgery  in China, and the best in east China. It is specialized in minimally invasive cardiac surgery, heart transplantation, aortic surgery, coronary artery bypass graft and cardiac valvular surgery. The department has 3 general wards, 1 special ward, 1 ICU, and 10 operating rooms, which include 1 hybrid operating room with the most advanced technology in the world. With 17 senior experts and 90 percent of the faculty having a master’s or doctoral degree, the department has a well-structured talents team. It undertakes several key scientific and technological projects of the tenth, eleventh and twelfth “five-year plan” and various projects supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China, “national 863 program”, Ministry of Health, and Shanghai Municipality. The awards it has won include the second prize of the Chinese Medical Technology Prize, the prize for Progress in Science and Technology by Ministry of Health, the prize for Progress in Science and Technology by Shanghai City, and the first prize of the Shanghai Medical Science and Technology Award.

Clinical Features and Research Achievements

Directed by Wang Chunsheng, the department make use of its clinical advantages and set up 5 sub-specialties, which are Cardiac Valve Surgery, Coronary Artery Surgery, Terminal Heart Disease Surgery, Large Vessel Surgery, and Minimally Invasive Cardiovascular Surgery.

Cardiac Valve Surgery  Zhongshan Hospital is the cardiac valve research center in Shanghai, and it renders best diagnosing and treating skills in the process of cardiac valve surgeries. The number of cardiac valve surgeries it performs annually is more than 2,000, of which over 300 are minimally invasive, making it a leader in this field in China. In 1977, it developed the first artificial valves, such as bovine pericardial valve, porcine aortic valve, and dura mater valve, and applied them to clinical practice. It first proposed the non-planar characteristics of mitral annulus in the cardiac cycle and, based on this finding, it conducted some researches and developed a new type of artificial mitral annulus and applied it to medical use. The department has rich experience in performing complex mitral valve repair and small aortic root surgery. And this sub-specialty won the second prize for Progress in Science and Technology by Ministry of Health.

Coronary Artery Surgery   The department performs pump coronary artery bypass grafting, off-Pump coronary artery bypass grafting, coronary artery malformation remedy, repairing myocardial infarction complicated with ventricular septal perforation, resection of ventricular aneurysm, left ventricle reconstruction and the Da Vinci robot - assisted coronary artery bypass grafting. It is one of the first institutions to perform total arterial bypass and coronary artery bypass grafting in bilateral internal mammary artery. It has performed more than ten thousand of coronary artery bypass graftings so far, with an annual amount of 1,000, making it a leader among general hospitals in China. It is also one of the first institutions that combined the research achievements of stem cell transplantation with bypass surgery for treating patients with heart failure caused by myocardial infarction. The related researches won a second prize of the Chinese Medical Technology Prize.

Terminal Heart Disease Surgery   The department has accomplished almost 400 heart/lung transplant operations, and in terms of the amount, it ranks the third in China. It was recognized by National Health and Family Planning Commission as one of the first institutions to perform heart transplantation, and it takes the lead in formulating the technical standard and access system of heart transplantation in China. It created records by  successfully performing the heart transplantation for a 12-year-old and a 77-year-old. For the first time in China, it transplanted a heart twice, and for the first time in Asia, it performed heart and liver transplantation on the same patient at the same time, heart, liver and kidney transplantation on the same patient at the same time, and dextrocardia transplantation. It improved the heart preserving technology, which made it possible to keep the heart safely for 10 hours. Its achievements had won the second prizes of the Chinese Medical Technology Prize and the Progress in Science and Technology of Shanghai Award, as well as the first prize of the Shanghai Medical Science and Technology Award.

Large Vessel Surgery   As one of the most influential diagnosing and treating center in China for patients with large vessel diseases, the sub-specialty of the department routinely performs operations on thoracic aortic aneurysm, which includes the complex total aortic arch replacement of artificial vessel and total thoracoabdominal aortic replacement. Each year, it at least performs 200 operations on the acute dissection of aorta and 300 aortic aneurysm surgeries. It opened the first green channel for acute aortic dissection in east China, and the inpatient mortality rate is lower than 10 percent, reaching an internationally advanced level. It is the only large vascular center in China capable of performing acute dissection aorta root reconstruction using David technique, which was granted the third prize of the Award of Applying and Promoting New Clinical Technologies Award by Zhongshan Hospital.

Minimally Invasive Cardiovascular Surgery

The department is one of the most skillful centers in China specialized in minimally invasive heart surgery. It regularly performs TAVI, thoracoscopic cardiac valve surgery, and the Da Vinci robot-assisted mitral valve surgery for elderly patients with high risks. It also performs difficult operations such as minimally invasive valve surgery and minimally invasive valve re-do. In 2000, for the first time in China, it performed minimally invasive coronary artery bypass grafting with the assistance of an Aesop robot. In 2009, it became the second hospital in China to perform minimally invasive coronary artery bypass grafting with the assistance of the Da Vinci robot and 5 years later, it became the first hospital in Asia to perform coronary artery bypass graft suture anastomosis while the heart was beating. Some of the world’s top cardiovascular disease journals published our achievements in minimally invasive surgeries. The department has won several awards, which include the second prize of the Progress in Science and Technology of Shanghai Award, the Clinical and Medical Achievement of Shanghai Award, and the Award of Applying and Promoting New Clinical Technologies by Zhongshan Hospital.