Obstetrics

Department Director: Zhang Xiaohong Deputy Director Liu Guoli Department Assistant: Zhou Jingwei

Department Overview:

1．Staffing: 5 chief physicians, 5 associate chief physicians, 8 attending physicians, 3 resident physicians, 1 associate research fellow, 1 assistant research fellow, 1 associate chief technician, and 58 nursing staff.

2．Beds: 56, including 9 single-room wards.

3．Facilities: a perinatal healthcare outpatient clinic and obstetric B-ultrasound room, wards, delivery rooms, and a prenatal diagnosis laboratory.

Current Status of the Department

As part of obstetrics and gynecology, the Department of Obstetrics has accumulated extensive experience in perinatal healthcare, pregnancy complications, and the rescue of critically ill patients, based on the many years of development of the national key discipline. In recent years, it has further developed prenatal diagnosis and expanded its development directions. It has also continued to develop while undertaking extensive medical, teaching, and research responsibilities.

1. Perinatal healthcare: The department has a comprehensive prenatal healthcare system and a high-risk pregnancy management system, and provides pregnancy health education and postpartum guidance throughout the year. The health education provided by the expectant mothers’ school has continued for decades. Courses are taught by senior obstetric experts and head nurses of our hospital; they are rich in content and diverse in format, attracting large numbers of pregnant women, postpartum women, and their families. The outpatient clinic offers general, specialist, and expert clinics, with comprehensive prenatal examination and diagnostic methods, an independent obstetric ultrasound examination system, and prenatal and intrapartum monitoring systems. Prenatal screening for fetal anomalies and the relatively high rate of intrauterine diagnosis have improved the quality of perinatal healthcare. A specialist prenatal diagnosis clinic has been established to provide consultation for pregnant women in whom fetal abnormalities are detected and to perform subsequent prenatal diagnosis. Our hospital is one of the national pilot institutions for labor analgesia. The delivery room provides painless delivery during labor, a welcoming labor environment, and midwife-accompanied delivery. The wards provide multiple services, including newborn hearing screening and newborn congenital heart disease screening. Over the years, we have leveraged the advantages of a general hospital and accumulated extensive experience in the diagnosis and treatment of pregnancy complications, particularly medical comorbidities such as hematological diseases, thyroid disease, heart disease, kidney disease, and epilepsy complicating pregnancy. Currently, our hospital is a referral and consultation center for hematological diseases complicating pregnancy in Beijing, and pregnant women with severe hematological diseases during pregnancy from Beijing and surrounding areas are referred to our hospital for treatment.

2. Rescue of critically ill patients: The department is currently one of Beijing’s centers for the rescue of critically ill pregnant and postpartum women, as well as a training and assessment base for obstetric skills and maternal care in Beijing. Each year, it widely accepts referrals of critically ill pregnant and postpartum women from Beijing, outlying districts and counties, and other regions. A maternal rescue team composed of experts from multiple departments has been established within the hospital. With the cooperation of various hospital departments, especially Hematology, Cardiology, Respiratory Medicine, the operating room, the blood bank, and SICU, the team has successfully rescued many critically ill pregnant and postpartum women with severe hematological diseases complicating pregnancy, multiple organ failure, malignant tumors, amniotic fluid embolism, and DIC. The rescue success rate has reached an advanced domestic level. The department also undertakes obstetric skills training for medical and nursing personnel from multiple institutions, providing talent development for maternal care in Beijing.

3. Prenatal diagnosis: The department is currently one of Beijing’s prenatal diagnosis centers. Clinically, it has implemented (1) maternal serum screening: targeting fetal chromosomal diseases and neural tube defects, pregnant women may undergo two serological screenings at 11-13+6 weeks and 15-20 weeks of pregnancy, or non-invasive DNA testing. (2) Maternal plasma cell-free fetal DNA prenatal testing technology; our hospital began this technology in 2016 for non-invasive prenatal screening of fetal chromosomal abnormalities, greatly improving the accuracy of prenatal screening. (3) Prenatal diagnosis technology using amniocentesis and amniotic fluid cell culture: pregnant women at high risk on screening, aged over 35 years, with a previous adverse pregnancy or delivery history, or with suspected fetal malformations on B-ultrasound may undergo amniocentesis for fetal karyotyping at 16-22+6 weeks of pregnancy. The laboratory has advanced equipment and 5 technical staff. The technology is mature; advanced foreign techniques have been introduced for cell culture and slide preparation, with a success rate of over 98%. Chromosomal karyotype analysis uses an advanced automatic karyotype analyzer, allowing images to be saved and facilitating consultation for abnormal cases. (4) FISH rapid chromosomal karyotype analysis technology for fetal amniotic fluid and umbilical cord blood. (5) Fetal umbilical cord blood sampling technology: umbilical cord blood sampling technology was initiated in 1999 and has been maturely applied to clinical prenatal diagnosis. It can be used for intrauterine diagnosis of chromosomal abnormalities, intrauterine infection, and fetal single-gene genetic diseases. (6) Chorionic villus sampling technology has been implemented, greatly advancing the timing of prenatal diagnosis. (7) B-ultrasound prenatal fetal anomaly screening: the obstetric color ultrasound room is equipped with advanced ultrasound diagnostic instruments. In particular, its rate of intrauterine diagnosis of severe congenital heart malformations has reached an advanced level domestically and internationally. Routine screening and intrauterine diagnosis of fetal cardiac malformations during pregnancy are currently performed. In collaboration with cardiac surgery and pediatrics, multidisciplinary consultations are provided for fetal cardiac malformations, pregnancy monitoring plans are developed, and, in cooperation with Fuwai Hospital, fetuses with severe cardiac abnormalities are referred after birth for timely surgery, improving the treatment success rate for severe fetal cardiac abnormalities. (8) Fetal magnetic resonance imaging examination technology: the Prenatal Diagnosis Center, in collaboration with the Department of Radiology, performs fetal magnetic resonance imaging examinations during pregnancy, improving the diagnosis of fetal abnormalities during pregnancy. Fetal cranial magnetic resonance imaging has increased the detection rate of fetal central nervous system abnormalities.