Rheumatology and Immunology

The Clinical Immunology Center/Rheumatology and Immunology Department/Institute of Rheumatology and Immunology of Peking University People's Hospital is a National Key Clinical Specialty, a Ministry of Education Innovation Team, a Beijing Key Laboratory of Rheumatology, a Beijing International Science and Technology Cooperation Base, and the first Asia Pacific League of Associations for Rheumatology (APLAR) center in China. It comprises four campuses: Beijing Xizhimen, Tongzhou, Qingdao, and Shijiazhuang; it recorded 240,000 outpatient visits last year. The department has a clinical and research team of more than 140 people, including 31 professors/chief physicians and associate professors/deputy chief physicians, 11 doctoral supervisors, 7 postdoctoral supervisors, 14 master's supervisors and associate doctoral supervisors, 17 attending and resident physicians, more than 12 researchers/assistant researchers and laboratory personnel/technicians, more than 50 postdoctoral fellows, doctoral and master's students, and research personnel currently in training, and a nursing team of 25, including 1 deputy chief nurse and 5 nurse supervisors.

Appointments held by members of the department in China and internationally include former President of the International League of Associations for Rheumatology (ILAR), former President of the Asia Pacific League of Associations for Rheumatology (APLAR), former Chair of the Rheumatology Branch of the Chinese Medical Association, Chair of the Autoimmunity Branch of the Chinese Society for Immunology, member of the WHO Committee on Musculoskeletal Diseases, Standing Committee member of the Rheumatology Branch of the Chinese Medical Association, Chair of the Rheumatology and Immunology Branch of the Chinese Women's Physicians Association, Vice President of the Chinese Women's Physicians Association, and President-elect of the Beijing Rheumatology Society, among others.

Academic honors and titles received include 973 Program Chief Scientists, recipients of the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars and the Wu Yang Award, CMB Distinguished Professors, Elsevier Highly Cited Scholars, Ministry of Education Trans-Century Outstanding Talents, Ministry of Science and Technology Leading Science and Technology Innovation Talents, National Ten Thousand Talents Program Talents, Young Changjiang Scholars, and Beijing Science and Technology Rising Stars, among others.

The team has led more than 120 national-level projects, including 973 Program projects and key projects of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, as well as more than 30 national multicenter studies. It established the early rheumatoid arthritis (eRA) classification criteria, the Clinical Deep Remission criteria (CliDR), and a series of diagnostic biomarkers, including anti-SRA antibodies, anti-α-fodrin antibodies, and anti-membrane DNA antibodies; developed a targeted treatment approach for systemic lupus erythematosus using low-dose interleukin-2, which has also been used for autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, Sjögren syndrome, and myositis; and studied and introduced the prolonged intensive treatment (PRINT) regimen for RA, which has been recommended by international guidelines.

Team members have published more than 1,100 papers as first or corresponding authors in Science, Nature Medicine, Nature Communication, Immunity, Lancet Rheumatology, and other journals. Among them, 12 have published, as first or corresponding authors, papers in CNS or NLJB and their subjournals, or in journals of higher rank. More than 20 have served as editors-in-chief or deputy editors-in-chief of books/journals. The team sponsors the journal Rheumatology &Autoimmunity and has served as chief editor or chief translator for more than 30 rheumatology monographs, including Rheumatoid Arthritis and Kelley's Rheumatology. It is at the international forefront in research on the mechanisms and diagnostic and treatment methods of rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, and Sjögren syndrome.