Pain Medicine

The Pain Department of Hangzhou First People's Hospital opened its outpatient clinic in 1985 and its inpatient ward in 2011. It was one of the earliest institutions in Zhejiang to provide pain diagnosis and treatment. It is now a key medical discipline and key clinical specialty in Hangzhou, the deputy-chair institution of the Pain Branch of the Zhejiang Medical Association, and its pain-related research has won the third prize of the Zhejiang Science and Technology Progress Award. It has also received honors including Hangzhou's “High-Level Talent (minimally invasive intervention for disc herniation) Studio,” the title of “Good Doctor with Warmth in Zhejiang,” and the “Outstanding Medical Team Award.” The department offers comprehensive diagnostic and treatment technologies and specializes in minimally invasive intervention. Its diagnosis and treatment of spine-related pain, joint and soft-tissue pain, and neuropathic pain are at a leading or advanced domestic level. It is one of the few institutions in the province able to skillfully perform whole-spine endoscopy (cervical, thoracic, and lumbar). It diagnoses and treats more than 10,000 patients annually, performs about 700 operations each year, with national-level operations accounting for nearly 50%, and has held national- and provincial-level continuing-education courses for many consecutive years. It has trained hundreds of visiting pain-specialty physicians from inside and outside the province. In recent years, the department has undertaken multiple projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation, the provincial Natural Science Foundation, and the municipal Natural Science Foundation, and has published dozens of high-level academic papers.