Anaesthesiology

The Department of Anesthesiology of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Dalian Medical University is a clinical subspecialty that integrates clinical anesthesia and pain medicine. It currently has 51 physicians, including 7 chief physicians, 14 deputy chief physicians, 24 attending physicians, and 6 resident physicians; personnel with a master's degree or higher account for 98% of the total. It has 1 doctoral supervisor and 9 master's supervisors. It also has 26 anesthesia nurses, including those in the post-anesthesia care unit and the APS team. It has 2 operating rooms, a pain clinic, pain wards, an anesthesia clinic, and a painless endoscopy diagnosis and treatment room.

Clinical anesthesia: The department undertakes anesthesia and intraoperative management for patients with various complex and critical conditions in all surgical departments. It can provide anesthesia simultaneously for 32 operations, with a routine volume of approximately 100 cases/day and approximately 25,000 or more anesthetic cases completed annually. It offers a full range of anesthetic techniques, including ultrasound/nerve stimulator-guided peripheral nerve blocks, ultrasound-guided arterial and venous puncture and catheterization, target-controlled infusion total intravenous anesthesia, intraoperative cardiac and hemodynamic monitoring by transesophageal echocardiography, pulmonary function and end-tidal carbon dioxide monitoring, neuromuscular blockade monitoring, lung isolation techniques, and management of difficult airways, including awake endotracheal intubation, lightwand-guided intubation, and fiberoptic bronchoscope-guided intubation. The number and severity of critically ill patients treated are at an advanced level nationwide. In addition, the Department of Anesthesiology has assisted in completing more than 1,000 robotic operations, including general surgery, cardiac surgery, urology, gynecology, and thoracic surgery; more than 100 liver, kidney, combined liver-kidney, and lung transplantation operations; and anesthesia for TAVI and ECMO in critically ill patients in cooperation with the Department of Cardiac Surgery. It has also actively promoted and completed anesthesia for day surgeries, including appendicitis, cholecystitis, and short urological procedures, making significant contributions to improving the patient treatment rate and accelerating the turnover of hospital beds.

In addition to completing routine work in the operating rooms, the Department of Anesthesiology has led comfortable medical care and hospital-wide multidisciplinary collaboration to complete nearly 10,000 painless anesthesia cases, including painless gastroscopy and colonoscopy anesthesia, painless fiberoptic bronchoscopy anesthesia, painless bronchial tumor treatment, and painless induced-abortion anesthesia. In cooperation with the CT Department, it has completed many cases of painless CT-guided radiofrequency ablation of lung cancer; in cooperation with the Department of Ultrasound, many cases of painless transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) and ultrasound-guided radiofrequency ablation; and in cooperation with the Department of Radiation Oncology, radioactive seed implantation. These services eliminate the pain caused by invasive examinations, helping patients recover from suffering as soon as possible and receive treatment comfortably. In addition, to ensure that expectant mothers no longer endure the torment of pain and to reduce fear during delivery and postpartum fatigue, our department has introduced labor analgesia, bringing good news to the majority of women giving birth. To address the difficulties encountered when children and other patients cannot cooperate with diagnosis and treatment, our department has also actively cooperated with the Department of Radiology and the Department of Urology to provide comfortable diagnostic and treatment services, including pediatric magnetic resonance examinations and pediatric lithotripsy, which have received unanimous praise from clinicians, patients, and their families.

In 2020, our department actively responded to the calls of the state and the hospital. In an effort to build a painless hospital, it took the lead in Dalian in establishing a pain management team (APS) and carrying out perioperative pain management. The core members of the APS team include 2 deputy senior/attending physicians and 2 charge nurses, providing all hospital patients with 24-hour postoperative pain and labor analgesia management available whenever called. During the several months when the epidemic in Dalian was severe, our APS established WeChat groups for postoperative patients, answering patients’ questions and resolving their concerns at any time and alleviating the difficulties of being unable to conduct face-to-face visits. This measure not only reduced patients’ pain but also eased their psychological burden, improved the quality of postoperative analgesia, and demonstrated the humanistic care and commitment of a painless hospital toward patients.

The Department of Anesthesiology has vigorously developed and built the Department of Pain, introducing major equipment such as ultrasound radiofrequency treatment systems and C-arms. In addition, it has carried out advanced minimally invasive procedures, including CT-guided nerve blocks, neuromodulation, neurolysis, and intrathecal morphine pumps, greatly reducing pain in patients with acute and chronic pain and those with intermediate- and advanced-stage cancer.

In 2021, to improve patient safety, reduce perioperative risk, and increase work efficiency, opening the anesthesia clinic became imperative. All physicians staffing the anesthesia clinic hold the rank of attending physician or above in our department. Their core tasks are pre-anesthesia assessment and completion of preoperative examinations, providing protection for high-risk patients undergoing painless diagnosis and treatment.

In addition to clinical work, since 2006 the department has undertaken 15 research projects at various levels and publishes several papers at various levels each year. The department also undertakes teaching responsibilities for graduate students, undergraduate students, and university students every year. Each year, it trains 1 full-time doctoral student, 4–5 doctoral students with equivalent educational qualifications, and more than 10 master's students. To date, it has trained and currently has 13 doctoral students and 146 master's students, who are working in major hospitals throughout China in clinical and research roles.