The hospital claims to be the earliest and largest chest hospital in China. It boasts the largest number of lung transplants in Shanghai and a leader in China.113 It employs over 130 chief and associate chief physicians, and 46 doctoral and master’s advisors. Over 30 of its experts receive special allowances from the State Council.114
Professor Gao Chengxin studied under the renowned Dr. Joel D. Cooper in 1985. He was the first Chinese doctor to study lung transplantation.
The lung transplant team was established in the early 1990s. Professor Gao Chengxin, Dr. Hu Dingzhong, Dr. Shi Jianxin, and two other doctors studied at Washington Hospital in the United States to master advanced lung transplant techniques. They then formulated and standardized Chinese operations based on situations in China.115
It started clinical lung transplants in 2002 and performed the first lobar lung transplant in China. It has performed the most bilateral lung transplants in China to date and assisted many hospitals in China with lung transplantation.116
The hospital’s archived web pages state its process for lung transplants:117
“If a lung transplantation suits your conditions, we will arrange necessary examinations. You will obtain the results in one or two days. A dedicated member from the lung transplant team will accompany seriously ill patients during the exam. We will then evaluate your situation: lung transplantation as soon as possible, or no transplantation at this point.”
“Once you are on the wait list, we will start preparation. The center will customize a plan for you according to your situation. We will determine the recipients based on blood type, severity of symptoms, wait time, and donor organ size and notify recipients as soon as possible. Patients have a special passage to be admitted in the shortest time and complete paperwork for hospitalization.”
“The patient will arrive in the operating room two or three hours prior to the surgery and be transferred to the ICU afterwards. He/she will be transferred to a regular ward after his/her conditions have stabilized. The patient can leave the hospital in usually two to three weeks, barring any complications.”
The hospital announced the total expense to be between 200,000 and 300,000 RMB.
Incidentally, Dr. Han Baohui, director of pulmonary medicine at Shanghai Chest Hospital, reported her classmate Zhao Bin to the police for practicing Falun Gong. As a result, Mr. Zhao was arrested on April 27, 2012 and subsequently tortured to death at the Tilanqiao Prison in Shanghai on October 19, 2013.118