Shanghai hospitals resume services

The number of outpatient and emergency services at tertiary and secondary medical institutions in Shanghai in May has bounced back to 40 percent of the same time period last year as the COVID-19 epidemic wave continues to wane in the city, a health official said on Sunday.

Except those diverted to function as designated medical institutions to treat COVID-19 cases, all the others have resumed outpatient and emergency services, and the number of clinic services, hospitalized patients, and surgeries are increasing, said Zhao Dandan, deputy director of the Shanghai Health Commission.

For example, he said, the number of outpatient and emergency services on a single day at Zhongshan Hospital and No 1 People's Hospital has both exceeded 10,000.

Also, the number of outpatient service daily at the Pudong branch of Renji Hospital surpassed 7,000, and the number of emergency treatment at Huashan Hospital has recovered to nearly 90 percent of the level before the current epidemic outbreak began in early March.

The number of surgical operations performed at hospitals in the city has climbed back to nearly 1,900 per day, including some technically difficult and complicated ones, said Zhao.

For example, Huashan Hospital and the Fudan University's Children's Hospital jointly performed a liver transplantation to an infant, and medical helicopters transported patients in two cases to Ruijin hospital to receive critical emergency surgeries.

Qian Juying, vice-president of Zhongshan Hospital, said the hospital provides surgical services every day at present, and the number of surgeries is around 200 daily, including nearly half highly difficult ones.

"The hospital has completed over 50 transplantation surgeries this month, including an internationally innovative dual living donor liver transplantation — one from a family member and another abandoned liver part from a patient," she said.

At the Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital of Fudan University, a 33-year-old woman, who had 180 uterine fibroids removed through three surgeries over the past four years, underwent a C-section on Monday and gave birth to a baby safe and sound.

Experiencing the unexpected pregnancy only four months after the last removal surgery, which left inadequate time for the uterus to repair and could lead to serious conditions during pregnancy, the woman surnamed Qiu was closely monitored for her health conditions by medical teams at the hospital weeks after weeks into pregnancy.

She was admitted for hospitalized monitoring in mid-March when she was pregnant for 24 weeks. Multi-disciplinary teams designed detailed and complete plans to guarantee the safety of her and the fetus, and avoided risk of uterine rupture and hemorrhage during pregnancy and surgery.