Gastroenterology
Overview
The Department of Gastroenterology is a Jiangsu Provincial Key Clinical Specialty, a national drug clinical trial base and key medical discipline under Wuxi Medical Talent and Science Promotion Project. It is also an affiliate member of the National Early Gastrointestinal Cancer Prevention and Treatment Center, Jiangsu Inflammatory Bowel Disease Specialty Alliance and Jiangsu Standardized Esophageal Disease Diagnosis and Treatment Alliance. Serving as a master training base for medical students of Jiangnan University and Nantong University, it is a comprehensive department integrating clinical practice, scientific research and teaching. There is one specialized ward respectively at the North and South Campus with a total of 89 inpatient beds. Each campus is equipped with a nearly 800-square-meter gastrointestinal endoscopy center, as well as specialist outpatient clinics, general outpatient clinics, exclusive clinics for inflammatory bowel disease and Helicobacter pylori infection. The department takes a leading position in Wuxi in terms of scale and technical strength. It is equipped with state-of-the-art facilities including modern electronic gastroenteroscopes, magnifying endoscopes, duodenoscopes, endoscopic ultrasonography, ultra-thin endoscopes, imported capsule endoscopes, double-balloon enteroscopes, imported remote-control digital gastrointestinal machines and gastrointestinal motility testing systems. The department has a team of 29 physicians, including 9 chief physicians (3 associate professors), 9 associate chief physicians, 8 attending physicians and 3 resident physicians. There are 3 master supervisors, 7 doctors (3 PhD candidates in service) and 15 masters, with the proportion of master and doctoral talents reaching 75.9%.
Treatment Scope
It mainly diagnoses and treats common and frequently-occurring digestive system diseases, including gastroesophageal reflux disease, peptic ulcer, chronic gastritis, Helicobacter pylori infection, functional gastrointestinal disorders, gastrointestinal polyps, inflammatory bowel disease, acute and chronic liver diseases with abnormal liver function, liver cirrhosis and its complications, biliary tract infection, acute and chronic pancreatitis, esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, colorectal cancer, liver cancer, cholangiocarcinoma and pancreatic cancer. It has abundant clinical experience in the diagnosis and treatment of difficult and critical digestive diseases, such as massive upper gastrointestinal hemorrhage, refractory inflammatory bowel disease, severe acute pancreatitis, acute obstructive suppurative cholangitis, autoimmune liver disease and autoimmune pancreatitis.
Technical advantages
The department has four featured subspecialties:
1. Early gastrointestinal cancer subspecialty: It performs precise endoscopic screening for early digestive tract cancers, and carries out endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) as well as derivative techniques including ESE, STER and POEM.
2. Inflammatory bowel disease and gastrointestinal motility subspecialty: Capsule endoscopy and double-balloon enteroscopy are available. Individualized comprehensive therapies such as enteral nutrition, biological agents, small-molecule drugs and fecal microbiota transplantation are adopted. Esophageal and anorectal manometry, gastrointestinal pacing and biofeedback therapy are applied for gastrointestinal motility disorders.
3. Biliary and pancreatic subspecialty: Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP), common bile duct stone extraction and biliopancreatic stent implantation are routinely performed.
4. Hepatology subspecialty: Endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS) for digestive system lesions, EUS-guided fine-needle aspiration/biopsy (EUS-FNA/FNB), EUS-guided puncture and drainage of pancreatic pseudocyst, liver biopsy, as well as endoscopic ligation, sclerotherapy and tissue glue injection for esophagogastric varices are conducted. Annually, the department completes over 50,000 endoscopic procedures, around 300 ERCP operations, more than 500 ESD and EUS procedures respectively, and over 100 cases of enteroscopy and capsule endoscopy examinations.
Research achievements
The department has undertaken more than 20 scientific research projects, including multiple national and provincial research fund programs. It boasts 1 talent selected into Jiangsu Provincial "333 High-level Talent Project", 1 Wuxi leading medical talent, 3 outstanding medical talents and 2 reserve outstanding talents under Wuxi Medical Science and Talent Promotion Program and Double Hundred Talent Program. In the past five years, it has won 1 First Prize and 3 Second Prizes of Jiangsu Provincial New Medical Technology Introduction Award, and published dozens of high-quality papers annually in SCI journals, Chinese Medical Association journals and other core academic journals. There are 3 associate professors and 3 master supervisors in the department. As an affiliated hospital of Jiangnan University and a teaching hospital & standardized residency training base of Nanjing Medical University and Nantong University, it has cultivated and delivered a large number of outstanding young medical talents.