Endoscopy Centre

After nearly 40 years of rapid development, the Endoscopy Center of Shanghai Pulmonary Hospital has become an advanced, comprehensive, and nationally leading center for interventional respiratory disease diagnosis and treatment. The department currently has 15 staff members, including 3 doctors with doctoral degrees and 3 staff members with senior professional titles. There are currently 6 endoscopy rooms, including 2 independent tuberculosis endoscopy diagnosis and treatment rooms. More than 20,000 endoscopic diagnostic and therapeutic procedures and more than 5,000 grade III and IV endoscopic operations are performed annually. One to two new technologies are introduced each year. Painless bronchoscopy and outpatient bronchoscopy examinations are routinely performed.

The department performs various diagnostic endoscopic techniques, including routine bronchoscopy (for internal medicine diagnosis and preoperative surgical evaluation), narrow-band imaging bronchoscopy (NBI), autofluorescence imaging bronchoscopy (AFI), transbronchial needle aspiration (TBNA), transbronchial lung biopsy (TBLB), cryobiopsy, endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS), virtual bronchoscopy (virtual navigation, VBN) combined with ultrathin bronchoscopy, electromagnetic navigation bronchoscopy (ENB), medical thoracoscopy, esophagoscopy, and gastroscopy. Therapeutic techniques include foreign-body removal, high-frequency electrosurgical treatment, argon plus electrosurgical knife treatment, laser treatment, treatment of malignant airway stenosis under rigid bronchoscopy, pleural adhesiolysis under medical thoracoscopy, bullectomy, tracheal/esophageal stent placement, high-pressure balloon dilation, cryotherapy, medical lung volume reduction, bronchial thermoplasty, bronchopleural fistula closure, percutaneous thermal and cryoablation, electromagnetic navigation-guided procedures (thermal ablation, cryotherapy, preoperative staining, and marker localization), bronchoalveolar lavage, and closure of tracheoesophageal and esophageal fistulas.

The department performs various specialized techniques, including the use of peripheral ultrasound, virtual navigation, electromagnetic navigation, and other technologies in the diagnosis and treatment of peripheral pulmonary nodules; endobronchial treatment of bronchial tuberculosis, lymph-node tuberculosis, and refractory tuberculous lesions; individualized comprehensive treatment of benign and malignant airway stenosis and other conditions; minimally invasive treatment of bronchopleural fistulas; and endoscopic treatment of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and bronchial asthma.

The Endoscopy Center of Shanghai Pulmonary Hospital is a respiratory endoscopy training base of the Chinese Medical Doctor Association and the first electromagnetic navigation training base in the Asia-Pacific region. Each year, it receives more than 100 physicians from China and abroad for advanced training, as well as trainees undertaking specialized training in interventional pulmonology under the PCCM program. The department organizes the International Forum on Interventional Pulmonology and the Training Course on New Advances in Bronchoscopy-Related Technologies every year. More than 60 residents and physicians receiving advanced training from China and abroad are trained annually, and targeted teaching is provided for new employees, standardized resident trainees, and subspecialty trainees. Each year, 5–10 specialized training sessions are held on EBUS-TBNA, EBUS-GS, and virtual navigation, more than 10 electromagnetic navigation demonstrations and teaching sessions are organized, and ongoing dedicated training is provided in grade III and IV respiratory endoscopic techniques, cultivating a large number of medical professionals engaged in interventional pulmonology in China and abroad.

Department staff have led and participated in multiple national- and municipal-level projects and have conducted a number of clinical studies. They have published more than 20 SCI-indexed papers and obtained more than 10 invention patents. The department edited the book Clinical Guidelines for Interventional Bronchoscopy and participated in compiling several monographs, including the Training Textbook for Specialists in Tuberculosis and Key Surgical Techniques in Thoracic Surgery—Pulmonary Resection and Bronchoplasty.