Neurology Department III

Neurology Department III relies on two specialized platforms—the Dalian Cerebrovascular Disease Diagnosis and Treatment Center and the Dalian Ischemic Stroke Diagnosis and Treatment Base—to serve patients with cerebrovascular disease. As the only cerebrovascular disease diagnosis and treatment center in the Dalian area, it currently has 36 physicians, including 14 senior-ranking physicians and 6 associate-senior-ranking physicians. It has two provincial laboratories: the Laboratory of the Liaoning Provincial Center for Translational Neurology and the Laboratory of the China–UK Center for Regenerative Medicine. In recent years, it has completed and undertaken 15 national-level projects, more than 20 provincial- and ministerial-level research projects, received 3 national-level awards and more than 20 provincial- and ministerial-level Science and Technology Progress Awards, and published more than 50 SCI-indexed papers. It has hosted and organized international and national academic conferences and national continuing-education programs many times. The Dalian Cerebrovascular Disease Forum is an academic conference with distinctive professional features in Liaoning Province and has become an important academic exchange platform in this field. The Cerebrovascular Disease Division of Neurology Department III, as the core ward of the Cerebrovascular Disease Diagnosis and Treatment Center, has three service platforms dedicated to providing patients with cerebrovascular disease with national-level, protocol-based and standardized services.

Department Highlights

Standardized Cerebrovascular Disease Diagnosis and Treatment Platform—Stroke Unit: It was the first in Liaoning Province to conduct research on ultra-early intravenous thrombolysis with r-TPA and has extensive clinical experience. It also has extensive clinical experience in other areas of cerebrovascular disease diagnosis and treatment, such as the clinical application of CISS in ischemic cerebrovascular disease, comprehensive prevention and treatment of transient ischemic attacks (TIA), and pharmacological and interventional treatment of intracranial and extracranial atherosclerotic stenosis. These technologies are at an advanced national level and a leading level within the province. Basic research on cerebrovascular disease, including acute-phase neuroprotection in ischemic cerebral infarction, stem-cell treatment for ischemic cerebral infarction, and experimental studies of atherosclerosis and therapeutic interventions, is also at an advanced national level.

In recent years, the department has undertaken the Ministry of Health’s Stroke Screening and Prevention and Treatment Base duties and opened a stroke-prevention clinic. Relying on this clinic, it focuses on the primary and secondary prevention of cerebrovascular disease and related research, has developed additional areas of strength in subspecialty research, and provides patients with cerebrovascular disease with national-level, protocol-based and standardized services.

Multidisciplinary Consultation Platform for Cerebrovascular Disease and Difficult Neurological Disorders: Established in 2009, it was the earliest such multidisciplinary joint consultation platform in Liaoning Province and the only one in Dalian. Every Thursday morning, it conducts multidisciplinary joint consultations for 2–3 patients with cerebrovascular disease or difficult diseases of the nervous system. To date, it has provided consultations for more than 400 patients with difficult diseases, establishing diagnoses and formulating further examination and treatment plans for many patients who had spent years traveling from place to place seeking care. It has received widespread praise and recognition from professionals in the field and has achieved substantial social benefits.

Platform for Cerebrovascular Disease and Neuropathological Diagnosis: Since 2012, the department has performed safe, standardized, and comprehensive muscle and nerve biopsy procedures and has comprehensively implemented histological, histochemical, enzyme-histochemical, and immunohistochemical staining techniques. Neurologists and pathologists jointly review the slides and provide pathological diagnoses for patients. To date, muscle biopsy has enabled the diagnosis, in dozens of patients in the Dalian area, of difficult neuromuscular diseases including motor neuron disease, myotonic dystrophy type 1, progressive muscular dystrophy, polymyositis, dermatomyositis, mitochondrial myopathy, and periodic paralysis; on the basis of muscle pathological diagnosis, it has also guided genetic diagnosis. At present, the department’s comprehensive muscle and nerve biopsy technology ranks at an advanced national level and at the leading level in Liaoning Province in terms of specimen acquisition, safety, standardization, and the breadth of staining techniques.