China's Top Departments: Urology at Changhai Hospital (Naval Medical University)

If you or a loved one is facing prostate cancer, benign prostatic hyperplasia, complex kidney stones or a urogenital tumor, the Department of Urology at Changhai Hospital is one of China's most established destinations — a flagship department backed by an academician and a national innovation team, within a tertiary hospital renowned for burns and cardiothoracic care.

Overview

The Department of Urology at Changhai Hospital is a National Key Discipline (one of the six national key disciplines led by Changhai Hospital) and one of the hospital's signature specialties. The department is recognized as a National Ministry of Education Innovation Team and centers on prostate disease and minimally invasive urology (including robotic surgery). It is the department carrying the hospital's key specialty focus on "minimally invasive diagnosis and treatment of prostate disease and complex urinary stones."

The hospital's prostate disease program has long been in China's top tier, and the department and hospital together constitute a major force in prostate cancer research in China.

Hospital Background

The First Affiliated Hospital of Naval Medical University (Shanghai Changhai Hospital) was founded in July 1949 and is a tertiary (Class A) general hospital that was among the first to enter the Class-A tertiary category in 1993. The hospital operates a "one hospital, two campuses, three affiliated institutions" structure, with its main campus on Changhai Road in Yangpu District, Shanghai.

According to the hospital's official "About Us" page, the main campus and the Xinjiangwancheng Health Check Center cover 145,800 m², with 65 clinical and medical-technical departments, over 2,100 beds, an annual outpatient and emergency volume of 3.6 million visits, and an average length of stay of 5.5 days. The hospital is home to three academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering. It has traditional strengths in burns and cardiothoracic disease, and has developed distinctive features in the minimally invasive diagnosis and treatment of prostate disease and complex urinary stones.

Academic Platforms

• National Key Discipline (Urology)
• National Ministry of Education Innovation Team (Urology and Gastroenterology)
• The hospital hosts 14 national clinical key specialties and 16 military specialty centers/institutes
• PLA (Military) Institute of Prostate Disease, based at Changhai Hospital

Academic Leader

Prof. Sun Yinghao (孙颖浩), Academician

• Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering (elected December 2015), urology expert, and former President of Naval Medical University
• Joined the urology department of Changhai Hospital in 1983 and became department director in 1998; he led the department for 16 years and built it into a national key discipline; since 2003 he has served as Director of the PLA Institute of Prostate Disease
• His research focuses on prostate cancer, urinary stones, and minimally invasive urology
• Chief Scientist of China's "973" Program; his team identified two new prostate cancer susceptibility loci specific to the Chinese population, published in Nature Genetics
• International recognition: The Lancet ran a January 2015 profile titled "Yinghao Sun: leader of research on prostate cancer in China"; in February 2015 he received the oncology "Alexander Savchuk Award" at the 26th International Cancer Congress in Paris — the first Chinese scholar to receive this honor
• He has held major international academic posts, including President of the 26th World Congress of Endourology (WCE) and President of the International Urology Congress (SIU)

Core Strengths

Prostate Disease

Prostate disease is the department's most signature focus, spanning early diagnosis, radical surgery, and comprehensive treatment of prostate cancer, as well as minimally invasive treatment of benign prostatic hyperplasia — built on the academician team's long-standing prostate cancer research.

Minimally Invasive Urology and Robotic Surgery

• On February 26, 2017, China's first da Vinci Surgical Robot International Training Center opened at Changhai Hospital; Academician Sun Yinghao demonstrated complex robotic-assisted minimally invasive prostate cancer surgery on site. The center is expected to train more than 500 people per year, filling a gap in domestic robotic-surgery training
• Technical features of da Vinci robotic surgery: wristed instruments with 7 degrees of freedom and 360° wrist rotation, with tremor filtration; 3D high-definition visualization magnified up to 10×; in radical prostatectomy, blood loss is reduced from 200–300 mL with conventional laparoscopy to 50–100 mL

Complex Urinary Stones and Urogenital Tumors

• Minimally invasive treatment of complex urinary stones is one of the hospital's key specialty directions, covering extracorporeal shock-wave lithotripsy and a range of endoscopic stone techniques
• The department performs more than 500 urologic tumor surgeries each year; in 2021 and 2022 it was repeatedly invited by the University of Turin, Italy, to give live surgical demonstrations at global academic conferences in Europe
• The self-developed "Sun's ureteroscope" (孙氏输尿管镜) is a representative medical-device achievement associated with the department

Rankings & Honors

• Fudan University Hospital Specialty Reputation Ranking · Urology: No. 7 nationally in the 2023 reputation ranking (reputation score 3.595)
• Fudan University Hospital Specialty Comprehensive Ranking · Urology: No. 6 nationally in the 2022 comprehensive ranking (score 51.67)
• National Key Discipline and National Ministry of Education Innovation Team

Clinic & Address

• Address (main campus): 168 Changhai Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai 200433, China
• Switchboard / directory: +86-21-31166666; Outpatient hotline: +86-21-31161111
• Transportation: Metro Line 8, Xiangyin Road Station, Exit 1; buses 61, 75, 942, 537 (Changhai Hospital stop)

For a quick overview of the department, see the Changhai Hospital Urology department page. Related reading: Burn & Trauma Surgery at Changhai Hospital.