Haematology

Hematology is a traditionally strong specialty of the Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, with a long and profound history of disciplinary development. The Internal Medicine Hematology group established in 1960 was one of the two earliest hematology specialty groups in Shandong Province, led by the renowned Chinese hematologist Professor Zhang Chunyuan. In 1983, under the leadership of the famous hematology expert Professor Weng Weiquan, it became one of the first institutions approved by the State Council to confer master's degrees, and was the first in the province to carry out research on hemorrhagic-thrombotic disorders. As a major participating unit, it took part in a major national research project led by Academician Guan Huashi of the Ocean University of China, and also participated in the national hemoglobin survey collaboration group. In 1994, it pioneered bone marrow transplantation in Shandong Province, becoming a national clinical pharmacology base and a Shandong continuing medical education base. In 2008 it was designated a key discipline of Qingdao, in 2013 a clinical key specialty of Shandong Province, and in 2014 it formally obtained Shandong qualification for cord blood hematopoietic stem cell and unrelated-donor hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. In 2017 it established the multiple myeloma subspecialty, and in 2021 it performed the first commercial CAR-T therapy in Shandong Province.

Through the unremitting efforts of several generations, the Hematology Department now has eight subspecialties, continuously strengthening standardized, normalized, and integrated treatment of leukemia, lymphoma, multiple myeloma and other diseases, while refining distinctive research directions, with all subspecialties advancing in parallel. It has achieved leapfrog development in scale, medical services, specialty configuration, academic level, talent cultivation, and medical equipment, and has made remarkable achievements in medical care, teaching, and research.

2. Talent Structure

The Hematology Department has strong talent resources, having developed into a high-level medical, teaching, and research group with complete specialties, headed by doctoral supervisors and supported by a large contingent of high-quality young and middle-aged technical backbone personnel. The discipline currently has 45 full-time clinical physicians, of whom 24 hold titles of associate professor or above, accounting for 53% of the total; 100% hold master's degrees or above. There are 3 doctoral supervisors and 5 master's supervisors; 1 member serves on the editorial board of the Chinese Journal of Hematology, 2 on the Chinese Journal of Clinicians, and 6 on core journals such as the Chinese Journal of Practical Internal Medicine. The talent structure is reasonable; the academic leaders are recognized in relevant academic fields as having high academic attainment, outstanding achievements, and the ability to lead the discipline toward its goals, with doctoral degrees and senior professional titles. The main members of the transplantation group have studied or visited in the United States, Israel, Japan, and other countries; subspecialties such as leukemia, lymphoma, aplastic anemia, hemorrhagic-thrombotic diseases, and myeloproliferative neoplasms all have dedicated disease-specific treatment teams, with overall strength ranking among the national leaders.

3. Specialty Features

(1) Bone Marrow (Hematopoietic Stem Cell) Transplantation

Our department is one of the first units in China to carry out bone marrow (hematopoietic stem cell) transplantation; a patient who received bone marrow transplantation in 1995 has survived for nearly 30 years. As a traditional strength of the Hematology Department, allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation is the main feature of clinical work. The department has performed haploidentical, fully matched, unrelated-donor, and cord blood hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, covering all technical types of transplantation. It has successfully completed internationally rare cases such as three haploidentical transplants for a single aplastic anemia patient, and domestically the most difficult second-degree relative (male cousin donating to female cousin) haploidentical transplantation. Professor Xu Lanping, director of the Bone Marrow Transplantation Center of Peking University People's Hospital, has been appointed honorary director of our department and regularly guides hematopoietic stem cell transplantation work. Our center is a collection and transplantation hospital of the China Marrow Donor Program, and has established good cooperation with both the China Marrow Donor Program and Taiwan's Tzu Chi Marrow Donor Registry. A whole-course management system for transplant patients has been established, with individualized, refined treatment of conditioning regimens, maintenance therapy, and reproductive interventions. By the end of 2023, 439 hematopoietic stem cell transplantations had been completed, with a transplant success rate of 82.3%, higher than the 75% reported in domestic and international literature. In 2024, the Bone Marrow Transplantation Department of the Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University expanded to 30 transplant beds, becoming the largest bone marrow transplantation center in Shandong Province.

(2) Leukemia

Based on the pathogenesis of leukemia, chemotherapy, and analysis of prognostic factors, the department emphasizes risk-stratified group treatment and the use of new-drug combination chemotherapy regimens, aiming to reduce refractory/relapsed cases, shorten treatment cycles, and improve long-term survival. Drawing on accumulated experience and referring to international guidelines, the department has developed a complete treatment protocol suited to China's national conditions, continuously revised and improved in clinical practice. It routinely performs high-dose chemotherapy for acute leukemia, further refines and optimizes induction-differentiation therapy, actively explores the clinical work on minimal residual disease and drug-resistance reversal in acute leukemia, explores the patterns of occurrence and development of leukemia in the elderly, and optimizes treatment protocols for elderly leukemia patients. High-dose chemotherapy followed by autologous transplantation formulated for low-risk patients, and high-dose chemotherapy followed by allogeneic transplantation formulated for intermediate/high-risk patients have achieved good therapeutic results in leukemia patients.

(3) Lymphoma

At present, we were the first among hematology departments of tertiary general hospitals in the province to establish a lymphoma department. In the field of malignant lymphoma diagnosis and treatment, individualized treatment strategies and protocols are designed on the basis of standardization according to the patient's pathological type, stage, and prognostic score, providing comprehensive treatment including conventional chemotherapy, immunochemotherapy, intensive chemotherapy, and autologous or allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. The department continues to develop and optimize new-drug and conventional chemotherapy protocols for malignant lymphoma, carries out long-term follow-up of hematological tumors, and, in collaboration with oncology, radiology, and surgical departments, explores new models of comprehensive treatment including surgical treatment, radiotherapy, immunotherapy, and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, drawing on advanced domestic and international experience to establish distinctive diagnosis and treatment standards, further exploring optimal lymphoma treatment protocols suited to the Chinese population. The department is at an advanced domestic level in standardized diagnosis and comprehensive treatment of lymphoma; diagnosis relies not only on pathology but also on fine typing by cytogenetics and molecular methods with stratified treatment, and patients can receive comprehensive treatments including chemotherapy, immunotherapy, radiotherapy, and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation — in particular, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for lymphoma is one of the department's features. The specialty has a dedicated lymphoma clinic and ward, treating nearly 3,000 lymphoma patients annually.

(4) Multiple Myeloma

The department actively conducts myeloma-related research, clinical, and teaching work, and has established the Qingdao Multiple Myeloma MDT (multidisciplinary consultation) center, forming cross-disciplinary collaborative diagnosis and treatment with nephrology, orthopedics, imaging, cardiology, neurology, etc. It admits a large number of myeloma patients each year and is at the domestic leading level in myeloma diagnosis and differential diagnosis, standardized/individualized treatment, targeted therapy, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, and basic and clinical myeloma research. Currently it is at the domestic leading level in precise diagnosis of multiple myeloma, precise risk/prognostic stratification, standardized/individualized treatment, targeted and immunotherapy, and especially autologous stem cell transplantation and CAR-T cell therapy, and actively conducts multiple myeloma clinical trials to provide satisfactory diagnosis and treatment services for the many multiple myeloma patients.

(5) Bleeding Disorders

The bleeding disorders subspecialty is a traditional strength of the Hematology Department. A complete set of laboratory tests and workflows has been established at the Pingdu campus, enabling precise diagnosis and treatment of bleeding disorders, especially rare bleeding disorders. Through the Hemophilia Treatment Center of the China Alliance for Rare Diseases, comprehensive treatment for patients with congenital and acquired hemophilia is guaranteed. The treatment protocol for refractory/relapsed immune thrombocytopenia has been refined, with a high response rate. The Qingdao, Yantai, and Weifang Bleeding Disorders Alliance has been established; as the leading unit, it conducts regular academic exchanges and consultations on difficult cases, with services radiating across Shandong; its level of diagnosis and treatment of bleeding disorders leads the nation.

(6) Anemia

The department has received funding from the Young Scientists Fund of the National Natural Science Foundation of China to study the role and mechanism of leptin non-utilization in the hematopoietic microenvironment in the pathogenesis of aplastic anemia; at the same time, the department conducts basic and clinical research on immunosuppressive therapy for severe aplastic anemia, achieving good results with antithymocyte globulin (ATG) for severe aplastic anemia. Diagnosis and differential diagnosis of anemia are standardized and accurate; the therapeutic efficacy for severe aplastic anemia has consistently ranked at the domestic leading level. Treatment with antithymocyte globulin combined with TPO receptor agonists has shown no severe toxic side effects so far. In hemolytic diseases, the department has diagnosed and treated a variety of common and rare congenital or acquired hemolytic anemias.

4. Medical Technology

The department currently has 169 open beds, comprising the Hematology ward of the Shinan campus, the Bone Marrow Transplantation Center of the Shinan campus, the Hematology ward of the West Coast campus, the Lymphoma ward of the West Coast campus, and the Hematology Department of the Pingdu campus, together with the hematology outpatient clinic of the Laoshan campus — a comprehensive hematology diagnosis and treatment center integrating medical care, teaching, and research. Annual outpatient visits exceed 60,000, and annual discharges exceed 9,000 cases, with strong influence and reach in the areas surrounding Qingdao.

5. Research and Teaching

In recent years, the Hematology Department has undertaken 2 projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and more than 10 commissioned research projects from provincial and municipal governments and enterprises/institutions; it has won more than 10 provincial and municipal research awards; and has published more than 300 papers in domestic public academic journals and in SCI, MED, ISTP, etc. It has participated in 15 national and provincial multicenter clinical studies, including 11 at the third tier and 4 at the fourth tier. It has carried out multiple new technologies and new projects, has over 1 million yuan in disposable research funds, and has invited renowned domestic scholars as visiting professors. It actively cooperates with the Institute of Hematology of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (Blood Diseases Hospital), Peking University People's Hospital, and the First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University. Currently 8 physicians serve as national-level committee members and 9 as vice-chairpersons of provincial academic societies. The department actively leads medical consortium construction and regularly organizes academic activities to strengthen cooperation and exchange.

The department adheres to developing innovation in teaching practice. Relying on the national demonstration teaching center of basic medicine, it undertakes teaching and research work in diagnostics and hematology, and was the first in the university to introduce multimedia teaching and bilingual teaching, achieving remarkable results. In the past 3 years it has actively recruited master's and doctoral talents in hematology. Staff participate in professional advanced training outside the province every year (including nursing trainees); the specialty has hosted 3 national continuing medical education projects, 2 provincial continuing medical education projects, and 1 Qingdao continuing medical education project.

6. Visit Guide

(1) Department Locations

Shinan campus outpatient clinic: 4th floor of the outpatient building

Laoshan campus outpatient clinic: 2nd floor of the outpatient building

West Coast campus outpatient clinic: 3rd floor of the outpatient building

Pingdu campus outpatient clinic: 4th floor of the outpatient building

Lymphoma ward: 3rd floor of the outpatient building

Shinan campus inpatient ward: 7th floor of the Deren Building

West Coast campus inpatient ward: 9th floor, Building B of the inpatient building

Pingdu campus inpatient ward: 10th floor of Building 2

Lymphoma ward: 21st floor, Building B of the inpatient building

(2) Consultation Telephones

Shinan campus: 82911393

West Coast campus: 82919615

Pingdu campus: 82918728

Lymphoma ward: 82919699