Nephrology

The Department of Nephrology of the First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University was established in the early 1990s under the guidance of Professor Zheng Weiru, a nationally renowned nephrology and toxicology expert, and Professor Chen Yunzhen, a cardiovascular disease expert, both from Shanghai Medical University, and is a nephrology specialty of considerable renown in Southwest China that integrates clinical care, teaching and research. The nephrology specialty obtained authorization to confer master’s degrees in Internal Medicine in 1995 and authorization to confer doctoral degrees in Internal Medicine (Nephrology) in 2000, was included in the Chongqing Medical Key Discipline (Nephrology) Construction Project in 2009, was approved in 2010 as the Chongqing Hemodialysis Quality Control Center and the Chongqing Blood Purification Specialist Nurse Training Base, was approved in 2014 as the National Blood Purification Training Base for County-Level Hospitals, became a Chongqing Clinical Key Specialty Construction Project in 2016, became the Chinese Society of Nephrology-certified “National Hemodialysis Management Demonstration Center” in 2017, and received the National Health Commission’s title of “Quality Service Post for Improving Medical Services” in February 2018, making it the only institution in the national hemodialysis field to receive this honor; in the same year, it was approved as a Chongqing Clinical Key Specialty (Nephrology), took the lead in establishing the Bayu Nephrology Specialty Alliance, and became its chairing institution; in 2022, it became one of the first batch of National Standardized Hemoperfusion Diagnosis and Treatment Demonstration Centers and a Chongqing Municipal Health Commission Blood Purification Technology Training Base. The Department of Nephrology currently includes inpatient wards, the Blood Purification Center and the nephrology outpatient clinic, among other departments; the ward has 100 beds in operation. In the early 1970s, under the guidance of Professor Zheng Weiru, it took the lead in performing renal biopsy in China and was one of the earliest institutions in the country to conduct clinical-pathological research on kidney diseases. In recent years, it has continuously standardized new immunotherapies for glomerular diseases, strengthened the management of difficult and critical renal diseases and chronic disease management of CKD, and reached an advanced level in China in the diagnosis and treatment of various kidney diseases. Currently, the Department of Nephrology is one of the largest hemodialysis centers in China, comprising two hemodialysis sites, the main hospital and the First Branch Hospital, and is equipped with advanced hemodialysis machines and water treatment systems from international brands. The center has established MDT teams for hemodialysis vascular access and CKD-MBD and offers the subspecialties of hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis and CRRT. Hemodialysis vascular access is the most distinctive and influential subspecialty. The annual number of operations exceeds 3100, and the annual number of day surgeries exceeds 1800; it is one of the largest and most influential vascular access diagnosis and treatment centers and training bases in China, its interventional treatment of vascular access ranks at an internationally advanced level, it was the first in the world to report “ultrasound-guided interventional treatment to recanalize an arteriovenous fistula occluded for 13 years,” and it was also the first to propose the “Mother-child” technique for recanalizing central venous occlusive lesions; it initiated the drafting of China’s first edition of the “Expert Recommendations on Interventional Treatment of Central Venous Lesions Related to Hemodialysis Access.” The Department of Nephrology is one of the earliest institutions in China to use CRRT to rescue critically ill patients. The department has established a professional team; in addition to conventional CRRT, double plasma molecular adsorption, double-membrane plasma exchange and artificial liver technologies, it also conducts extracorporeal CO2 removal, endotoxin adsorption for sepsis, inflammatory mediator/cytokine adsorption, plasma immunoadsorption and a number of other new technologies, providing critically ill patients in multiple disciplines and fields with a new, high-quality blood purification and organ support platform that has greatly improved patient prognosis. Currently, several physicians in the department hold positions in national academic societies, such as committee members and chairs of branch study groups, as well as chairpersons and deputy chairpersons of provincial nephrology branches. The department has received funding from dozens of grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China and provincial- and ministerial-level funds, among others. Key scientific research directions include renal injury caused by disorders of glucose and lipid metabolism, and the management, prevention and treatment of complications of chronic kidney disease (including vascular access), among other areas. It has published nearly 100 SCI papers, obtained more than 10 utility model patents, and edited or co-edited more than 10 monographs. In 2023, it received the Hospital Science and Technology Innovation Award of the Chinese Hospital Association; in 2022 and 2023, it won, for two consecutive years, the first prize for the Chongqing Medical Association’s Blood Purification Technology Application and Academic Promotion Project and the second prize for Complication Diagnosis and Treatment Technology, among other awards. In recent years, our department has been dedicated to promoting hemodialysis technology and cultivating professionals in Chongqing. It has successively undertaken the Chongqing Municipal Health Commission Appropriate Technology Promotion Project, the Chongqing Medical Association training of specialist physicians (technicians) in hemodialysis, and the Chongqing Hemodialysis Specialist Nurse Training program. In the area of vascular access, the team took the lead in China in creating a “multi-mode-multi-platform-multi-dimensional” technology promotion and training system, established a national “training-assessment-certification” platform for vascular access diagnosis and treatment technology, ensured the standardization and homogenization of technology promotion, has so far trained more than 400 visiting medical and nursing professionals from 25 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in China, and has delivered excellent presentations at more than 300 domestic and international academic conferences.