The First Visiting Professor’s Academic Exchange in the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University

From December 9th to December 13th, Prof. Dr. med. Joachim Pfeil, the former Medical Director of Hospital Wiesbaden and the leading expert of the Orthopaedic Clinic has come to the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University as a visiting professor. He conducted one-week academic exchanges, including ward round, outpatient, surgical guidance, surgical practice, department training, discussion on department management and complicated cases as well as public class.

Prof. Dr. med. Joachim Pfeil

Work Experience:

Since 03/1996: the leading expert of the Orthopaedic Clinic in St. Josefs-Hospital Wiesbaden;

10/1995-12/2018: Nomination for Medical Director of Orthopaedic Clinic and Hospital Wiesbaden;

09/1995: Nomination for Head of Orthopedic Department of Hospital

of Augustinians in Cologne;

06/1995: Substituting Head of Heidelberg University Orthopedic Hospital;

Membership:

2014: Congress President of French German Orthopaedic Association;

Editorial Board Member:

2008: Editor of Journal Extracta Orthopaedica

04/1996: Co-Editor of journal Orthopäde (Springer edition)

Sino-German Communication Center for Joint Surgery officially established

In the morning of December 9th, Professor Pfeil arrived at the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University and commenced his one-week visit in this hospital.

Guohui Nie, the Medical Director, Jianyi Xiong, the Associate Medical Director, Manyi Wang, the Head of General Department of Orthopedics and Anqing Liu, the Head of Joint Department held a welcoming ceremony for Prof. Pfeil and and welcome for his coming.

During the ceremony, Professor Pfeil and the leaders of the hospital respectively introduced the basic information of their hospitals. St. Josefs Hospital of Wiesbaden is one of the TOP 10 Joint Replacement Center in Germany.

In the ceremony, the Medical Director awarded Prof. Pfeil with Visiting Professor’s Plaque and then they unveiled the billboard of Sino-German Communication Center for Joint Surgery together. This marks the further progress of its Orthopedic Department’s Internationalized Strategy.

After the ceremony, Prof. Pfeil visited the Joint Department of the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University and had a complicated case discussion with the doctors in the department and offered his diagnosis and opinions based on his profound experience.

Instructing the department with advanced hip and joint surgical skills

In the early morning of December 10th, Prof. Pfeil attended the shift exchange and got to learn more about the basic function of the Joint Department.

Later, Prof. Pfeil visited the OR and gave some surgical guidance and surgical practice.

First of all, Prof. Pfeil instructed a total knee replacement surgery and shared the surgeons with the difference between their practice and the Chinese hospital’s during the surgery. Most importantly, Prof. Pfeil showed the surgeon the way he measures the verticality of the tibia.

Then in the next surgery, Prof. Pfeil showed the surgeons how he performed the total hip replacement surgery with the anterolateral approach (Watson-Jones approach). Nowadays Chinese surgeons prefer posterior approach but this approach would lead to redislocation. Compared to posterior approach, the anterolateral approach has many advantage including less damage to the muscle, less blood loss, less soft tissue damage and less redislocation rate. And also because the incision is on the lateral side, it would be more convenient for the postoperative care and healing.

The surgeons watching this operation have not so many experiences in the anterolateral approach THR so they think it is a really instructive surgery.

Sharing the newest progress in the hip replacement surgery in Shenzhen Joint Academic Salon

In the morning of December 11th, while attending the shift exchange meeting of the Orthopedics Department, Prof. Pfeil delivered a lecture on short stem THR. Prof. Pfeil showed the attendants how they use Optimys short stem by representing the images of the cases using short stem during perioperative stage and listing a lot data. Through this lecture the department have a knowledge of the anatomical features of this short stem and how this short stem can be used.

Then Prof. Pfeil had a ward round with the doctors in the department. A retired doctor accompanied his wife to the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University especially for Prof. Pfeil. The female has suffered from years of knne pain in the medial side and the MRI and X-ray shows that she has severe knee wearing in the medial side and it was a good indication for unicondylar arthroplasty. And the patient agree to take the surgery. So Prof. Pfeil performed the unicondylar arthroplasty for her on Friday(December 13th).

In the afternoon of December 11th, Prof. Pfeil was invited to attend a Shenzhen Joint Academic Salon. Prof. Pfeil shared his lecture on the history of trial and error of THA and the future development of THA.

Standard Care for the Patients during the Perioperative Period

In the morning of December 12th, Prof. Pfeil delivered a lecture on the Standard Care for the Patients during the Perioperative Period and he explained the Manual he edited in details during the lecture for the doctors.

During his stay as Medical Director in St. Josefs Hospital of Wiesbaden, Prof. Pfeil edited a manual named hipstop+ Das Handbuch on total hip replacement surgery.

This manual standardizes the procedure of total hip replacement surgery. And not only does it optimize and clarify the surgery process, but also does it help patients to get more aware of what kind of surgery they are going to have, so that they are more willing to cooperate and can get better recovery. So this manual helps in optimizing the surgical process, deepening patients’understanding and shortening the recovery duration, and it is so useful and practical that many European hospitals learn this and promote the manual in their hospitals.

Prof. Pfeil ‘s lecture includes theoretical and practical example and this perioperative stage manual lecture offer thinking to the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University on their treatment and diagnosis.

Practicing Physical Examination in The Outpatient Can Have More Accurate Diagnosis

In the afternoon of December 12th,Prof. Pfeil came to the outpatient room to have some outpatient diagnosis and during this period, Prof. Pfeil emphasized the importance of having physical examination during diagnosis for way of diagnosis is mo re accurate and scientific, and this awareness needs to be learned bu more and more doctors.

Prof. Pfeil had been the Associate Head of the Pediatric Orthopedics Department and the Chairman of the German Pediatric Orthopedics Society so he is also good at Pediatric Orthopedics. During the outpatient diagnosis he met with a infant with bone pain. Prof. Pfeil told the doctors that in Europe they will have ultrasound examination on infants who are at their four weeks old. This check greatly help them to reduce the chance of having hip dysplasia for they can correct this when they identify it in the fourth week. When Prof. Pfeil  went to Japanese for academic exchange, he found that Japan did not perform ultrasound examinations on infants then. As a result, many patients with congenital hip dysplasia did not receive timely intervention and correction, and finally had to undergo hip replacement surgery. But now Japan has more and more ultrasound examination on four-week old infants and there is less ad less hip replacement surgery on correcting congenital hip dysplasia. Professor Pfeil said that if this ultrasound could be popularized in Shenzhen, it would benefit more people and would effectively correct infant congenital hip dysplasia in a timely manner.

Surgical Practice of Knee Unicondylar Surgery

On December 13th, Prof. Pfeil started his last day of visiting professor schedule and he delivered three meaningful lectures, which include Short Stem Revision, Pain Control on Knee Replacement Surgery and the Approaches of Hip Replacement.

After the lecture, Professor Pfeil had a difficult case discussion with doctors. During the discussion, the doctors considered that knee replacement surgery is suitable for patients who meet the indications and the best age of having the surgery is between 60 and 70 years old. However, Professor Pfeil explained that age is not a contraindication. As long as the knee joint is severely wearing and the lateral side is intact, it is an indication for knee unicondylar surgery.

In the afternoon, Professor Pfeil came to the OR and performed a knee unicondylar surgery. During the surgery he explained the surgical procedures and key points to the doctors.

This patient is admitted by Professor Pfeil on Wednesday. The professor chose to perform knee unicondylar surgery on her with a Zimmer fixed platform prosthesis. The operation lasted 45 minutes, which was short and successful. The doctors who watched the operation highly admired Professor Pfeil's surgical technique.

The doctors involved in the operation said that the First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University has relatively little experience in performing knee unicondylar surgery, and Professor Pfeil's surgery provided them with a good learning model.

With the surgery coming to a successful end,of Professor Pfeil's academic exchange also came to an end. The doctors in the department expressed their sincere gratitude to Professor Pfeil, and said that during his visit, Professor Pfeil taught them many standard international diagnosis and treatment concepts, as well as world-leading knee and hip diagnosis and treatment experience and surgical methods, which have provided them with many thinking and direction of their future development.