Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine Pulmonary Nodule Diagnosis and Treatment Center

With the rapid development of medicine and the increasing importance placed on health examinations, detected small pulmonary nodules have become increasingly common. On imaging, pulmonary nodules can be divided into two types: solid nodules (SPN) and ground-glass nodules (GGO). How to respond to and manage a pulmonary nodule after it is discovered is a key issue that urgently needs to be resolved. Stage 0 lung cancers, such as carcinoma in situ and micro-lung cancer, mostly appear on chest radiographs and chest CT scans as small nodules about 1cm in diameter or smaller; at this point, patients are often completely asymptomatic. Benign pulmonary nodules do not require treatment; some nodules require periodic examinations and long-term follow-up observation, while others require their pathology to be clarified immediately. How to manage a nodule when it is first discovered requires the doctors of a multidisciplinary MDT team to answer questions and ultimately resolve the issue.

Lung cancer is the “king of cancers”; it has a high degree of malignancy, and both its incidence and mortality rank first among all malignant tumors. In China, the incidence of lung cancer continues to rise, with an average annual increase of 1．63%, including 1．30% in men and 2．34% in women. The incidence of adenocarcinoma associated with environmental pollution is increasing severalfold, surpassing lung squamous cell carcinoma to become the most common type, and the situation is extremely serious. Therefore, in addition to actively adopting preventive measures such as strict tobacco control and environmental improvement, rapidly establishing a multidisciplinary Chinese-Western integrated pulmonary nodule diagnosis and treatment center to provide patients with early diagnosis and early treatment has become key to improving the survival of lung cancer patients.

The Chinese-Western Integrated Pulmonary Nodule Diagnosis and Treatment Center of Zhejiang Provincial Tongde Hospital is composed of experts from Cardiothoracic Surgery, Respiratory Medicine, Oncology, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Radiology, Interventional Medicine, Pathology, and other departments. It has also established extensive cooperation with well-known medical centers in China. Adopting a multidisciplinary model, it integrates the resources and strengths of various disciplines to provide comprehensive diagnosis and treatment for pulmonary nodules, standardizes the diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary nodules—especially early lung cancer—and the research, development, and application of new technologies, striving to bring the center’s clinical diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary nodules, especially early lung cancer, to a leading level in China.

The center operates under a director-responsibility system guided by a chief expert and regularly conducts multidisciplinary case discussions, with the participation of experts and physicians from departments including Cardiothoracic Surgery, Respiratory Medicine, Medical Oncology, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Interventional Radiology, and Pathology. Guided by evidence-based medicine, it designs a tailor-made treatment plan for every patient with a pulmonary nodule, truly implementing multidisciplinary comprehensive treatment for pulmonary tumors as a single disease. The Departments of Respiratory Medicine and Radiology, among others, actively explore effective approaches to lung cancer screening and new technologies for early diagnosis to detect pulmonary nodules and early lung cancer. The Department of Pathology provides definitive pathological and molecular diagnoses, while Thoracic Surgery and other departments perform precise radical treatment of early lung cancer through thoracoscopic minimally invasive surgery. After surgery, Medical Oncology and Traditional Chinese Medicine provide standardized comprehensive treatment for lung cancer integrating Chinese and Western medicine, aiming to achieve satisfactory therapeutic results. With this multidisciplinary diagnosis and treatment model, malignant pulmonary nodules can be detected in a timely manner, and the survival rate of patients with early lung cancer is significantly improved after surgery combined with integrated Chinese and Western medicine treatment.

The center regularly organizes specialized training courses related to pulmonary nodules and, under its leadership, jointly holds academic forums with major hospitals in the province to strengthen regional academic activities. It also regularly holds national academic conferences in the name of the center, inviting renowned experts and scholars from China and abroad to exchange views and discuss the latest advances in the diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary tumors. Regular health lectures for patients are held on the theme of “Pulmonary Nodules and Tumor Diagnosis and Treatment”; meanwhile, experts from all departments of the center provide patients with free health consultations on site as a service to the broad patient community. Preventive measures such as tobacco control and environmental improvement are actively promoted. In recent years, the center has devoted itself to actively publicizing public health knowledge on smoking control and lung cancer prevention and treatment, conducting public science lectures and columns on smoking control and lung cancer prevention and treatment on radio, television, in newspapers, and on websites.

Center director: 何忠良, Director.

Location: 2-9 West Ward (Cardiothoracic Surgery) Telephone: 0571-89972395.