Dr. Sun Lizhong, Leading Expert in Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery

Current Role & Overview

• Medical Director: Shanghai Delta Hospital

• Experience: 42 years in clinical research, teaching, and practice in cardiovascular and      thoracic surgery.

• Reputation: A preeminent figure in China’s cardiovascular medical field.

Key Leadership Positions

• Director of the Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery Center, Beijing Anzhen Hospital      (Capital Medical University)

• President, Cardiovascular Surgery Physicians Branch of the Chinese Medical Doctor Association

• President-Elect, Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery Branch of the Chinese Medical Association

• Executive Director, Asian Association for Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery

Pioneering Surgical Contributions

• “Sun’s Procedure”: Developed the groundbreaking surgical technique for treating complex Type A aortic dissections.

• Global Standard: This procedure has become the international standard of care for the condition.

• Widespread Impact: Successfully applied in over 80,000 cases worldwide. (Source: China Medical Device Network)

Academic & Research Influence

• Publications: Authored over 460 academic papers in peer-reviewed journals.

• Books: Written and edited several influential medical books.

• Research: Led      numerous national-level research projects in cardiovascular medicine.

Other Specializations

• Recognized as a      pioneer in the surgical treatment of thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysms and      other complex cardiovascular conditions.

Introduction

When I first met Sun Lizhong, I sensed two powerful, intertwined forces: the incredible fragility of the human heart, where a tear in the aorta, thin as a cicada’s wing, can bring life to the brink of collapse; and a man’s deep-rooted determination, born from witnessing the loss of loved ones to inadequate medical care as a young boy. “I want to study medicine,” he said, recalling the pain that shaped his path.

His story began on a cold winter night in a remote agricultural commune in Northeast China, where medical care was virtually nonexistent. The tragedy of losing his younger brother to a treatable illness was a trauma that would forever shape him. That pain, instead of breaking him, forged a resolute will to pursue a career in medicine.

But his skills were truly forged in the life-and-death crucible of Fuwai Hospital, Anzhen Hospital, and Delta Hospital. There, alongside countless patients, he learned to interpret their silent struggles, to feel the faintest tremor of a pulse, and to listen to the desperate intuition of their families.

Fate seemed to guide him toward the most challenging field in cardiovascular surgery: major vascular diseases. Early surgical attempts were perilous, like walking a tightrope over an abyss. Yet, Sun persevered, innovating surgical techniques that would transform the field. Every stitch, every breakthrough, was more than a technical advance; it was a direct answer to the desperate pleas of patients and their families.

Now, after more than eight years at Shanghai Delta Hospital, Sun Lizhong continues his relentless mission to save lives, building a bridge to hope for countless patients.

The Spark of Medicine

Time rewinds to the summer of 1978. A hot wind carried dust across the Northeast Plain. On the wall of a middle school in Yitong County, a bright red list announced a young man’s fate: the first public results of the newly reinstated national college entrance exam. The words “Bethune Medical University” caught Sun Lizhong’s eye.

His heart raced with an unspoken emotion—this was his key to the world of medicine.

“I grew up in a commune where medical care was scarce,” Sun recalled, his voice tinged with emotion. “I’ll never forget that winter. My brother… he was only twelve and had a high fever for days. The village doctor was helpless.” He paused, his gaze drifting out the window. “That fever took him in just a few days.”

After that, Sun’s mother’s health also began to fail. He often accompanied her to the doctor, enduring long, anxious nights. Then came the sudden death of his grandmother, the panicked gasps of relatives echoing in the county hospital, and the childhood friend who lost his hand in a firecracker accident.

“From then on, he could no longer chase me through the fields.”

These memories solidified in Sun’s heart into a single, determined goal: “I want to study medicine.”

“At that time, medical school was tuition-free. My middle school teacher even said studying agriculture wasn’t necessary for rural kids like us… So, three of my classmates and I chose medical schools. Two went to Jilin Medical University, later renamed Bethune Medical University, and the third went to Jilin Medical College.”

In the early autumn of 1978, Sun arrived at Bethune Medical University in Changchun. The campus was filled with students from across China, reunited after a decade of turmoil during the Cultural Revolution.

“The age gap among students was huge back then,” Sun remembered, his eyes sparkling. “Many older ‘zhiqing’—the educated youth who had been sent to the countryside—also took the exam. The oldest was thirty-four, sixteen years my senior!” They were the “San Lao Jie” of their generation, a fast-track program for adults whose education had been delayed by the era.

“These older students had seen hardship and were hungry to learn. They’d often study by moonlight after the lights-out call. I learned so much from them.”

The vast world of medical science became Sun’s anchor. The dissection room, with its pungent smell of formalin, became his favorite place.

“I loved tinkering with tools since I was a kid,” Sun said with a smile, recalling his first time holding a scalpel. “When I made that first incision and explored the fascia, the vessels, the muscles… the precision of life was revealed under my fingers. It wasn’t a cold body anymore; it was the door to medicine, and it ignited my passion for surgery.”

One significant summer during college, Sun returned to his commune with his new medical knowledge. A young woman in the Li family had a swollen abdomen and a low-grade fever. The village doctor diagnosed liver ascites, but Sun suspected tuberculous peritonitis. He took her to a hospital in Changchun, where his diagnosis was confirmed. After treatment, the swelling subsided, and she was cured.

“Young Dr. Sun” became a trusted name in the village, and Sun Lizhong’s confidence grew with it.

The Life-and-Death Classroom

After five years of medical school, Sun Lizhong graduated and was assigned to Beijing’s Fuwai Hospital, a prestigious center for cardiovascular medicine. He felt fortunate, but the challenges were immense.

Sun’s greatest lessons came not from textbooks, but from his patients, their families, and his mentors.

“The longer you spend at a patient’s bedside, the more you learn from their silent cues—their temperature, their expressions, their sighs,” he recalled. “Back then, all we had were stethoscopes, basic EKGs, and a few books. We stuck close to patients so we wouldn’t miss a thing.” Seeing patients gasp for breath, feeling the subtle shifts in their pulses, and listening to the faint rhythms of their hearts—these were his true teachers.

“One day, a patient’s father, who was a plumber, stopped me. ‘Doctor,’ he said, ‘in my line of work, if the pump is weak, you might have a leak.’ That simple insight inspired a new rule: if a patient’s circulation is unstable after surgery, we must immediately open the chest to explore. That change saved countless lives.”

For Sun, patients and their families are the cornerstone of medical progress. “Whenever we save a patient, I think of the support from their families.” The hands-on guidance from his mentors was also critical to his growth.

Forging the Cornerstone

In 1989, Sun was transferred to the pediatric ward. The experience was heart-wrenching.

“The beds were filled with children suffering from congenital heart diseases,” he said softly. “I was training under eight senior physicians, each with their own style, but all generous with their knowledge.” At the time, pediatric heart surgeries were incredibly risky, with a low success rate. One week, five children died.

“The hardest part was talking to the parents. Some would sit in silence, while others would grab my sleeve, crying, ‘He was holding my hand and smiling just yesterday!’ I understood their pain—they had lost not just a child, but all of their hopes for the future.”

During those long nights, Sun wrestled with doubt. “Maybe it’s better to stop attempting these complex surgeries,” he thought.

“But the dean told me, ‘Doctors can’t give up on exploring. Only by stepping into the unknown can we pave the way for future generations.’ So, I persisted.”

One night, a young mother who had just undergone valve replacement suddenly turned blue and broke into a profuse sweat. The medical staff panicked. Sun suspected a massive leak and decided to reopen her chest.

“The director wasn’t on-site, and the dean was unreachable. A younger doctor beside me was pale with fear. The patient’s husband knelt before me, begging for help.”

Sun acted fast. When they opened her chest, they found a burst anastomotic opening. He repaired it, and the patient’s blood pressure slowly stabilized. Outside the ward, her husband knelt again, this time in tears of gratitude.

“At that moment, I realized: responsibility is a doctor’s fundamental conscience. Without the courage to take responsibility, there can be no breakthrough.”

Forging a Medical Professional

In the late 1990s, Sun took on the pioneering challenge of specializing in severe major vascular diseases, a field then considered nearly impossible in China.

“From 1958 to 1993, Fuwai Hospital performed only about 200 major vascular surgeries, with a mortality rate over 20%. For patients, it was like walking a tightrope over death.”

The aorta, as thin as a cicada’s wing, bears immense pressure. Once damaged, it can cause catastrophic failure in multiple organs. In the era before advanced cardiopulmonary bypass technology, surgery was a perilous gamble. For 35 years, seven successive department directors had switched specialties, leaving major vascular surgery a neglected field.

Why did Sun stay? “The progress of medicine depends on perseverance,” he said. He had witnessed too many patients suffer from postoperative complications, a fate he considered worse than death.

“Unlike other surgeries, cardiovascular procedures have two missions: to repair the organ’s structure and to restore its function.”

When Sun became director of the major vascular surgery department, he faced a dead end. Many experts frowned at the very mention of “major vascular.”

“I knew that if even the great experts hesitated, dying patients wouldn’t have a chance.”

Aortic diseases are extremely dangerous. In China, 100,000 to 500,000 new cases occur annually, with over 70% being aortic dissections. About 62% to 91% of patients with Type A aortic dissection die within a week of onset (Source: China Cardiovascular Health and Disease Report 2021).

To change this, Sun introduced the aortic elephant trunk operation from abroad in 1998. In 2003, he innovated the aortic arch replacement plus stented elephant trunk procedure, later known as “Sun’s Procedure.” This technique uses a stented graft to seal the tear, reconstructing the vessel and dramatically reducing the risk of rupture.

“This procedure is for patients with severe conditions, like Stanford Type A aortic dissection. It removes the diseased aortic arch and replaces it with a synthetic vessel. The ‘elephant trunk’ stent covers the rupture, reducing the risk of a future vessel rupture and creating conditions for further treatment.”

Sun’s Procedure significantly reduced surgical mortality from 20.8% to less than 5%. The postoperative false-lumen closure rate increased from 40% to over 95%, and the re-operation rate dropped from 30% to less than 10% (Source: China Medical Device Network).

Sun also created a detailed classification for aortic dissections in the Chinese population, forming a diagnostic and treatment model with unique Chinese characteristics.

“The U.S. was slower to adopt this because they often prioritize surgical mortality over overall mortality. In major vascular surgery, I promote the concept: ‘Patients can’t wait to die.’”

Sun’s innovations have saved countless lives, and he takes immense pride in his contributions.

The Road to Realizing Dreams

“Fuwai Hospital helped me grow, Anzhen Hospital helped me mature, and Delta Hospital makes me feel warmer.”

At Shanghai Delta Cardiovascular Hospital, Sun found a platform to achieve more as a physician.

“When I first came to Delta, it was just a project with buildings and no clear direction. An alumnus asked me and Professor Huang Lianjun to explore its potential. With our experience from Fuwai and Anzhen, we saw an opportunity to build a world-class cardiovascular surgery center here.”

Sun built a team, inviting experts like Academician Ge Junbo and Professor Liu Jianshi. Their goal was to create a new model: one where doctors could focus on clinical work while a professional management team ran the hospital. This allowed the hospital to truly center its focus on patients and physicians.

At Delta, Sun received full support from the investors.

“They weren’t seeking short-term returns, which allowed us to build a solid foundation. We integrated charity foundations, commercial insurance, and medical payment systems to create a sustainable healthcare ecosystem. This let our team focus on what matters most: saving lives.”

Sun applied his core clinical achievements from Fuwai and Anzhen to Delta. His organ-protection technology reduced postoperative kidney damage and pulmonary complications. Improved surgical strategies shortened operation times and reduced the need for blood transfusions. Innovative medical devices, like interventional stents, also played a key role.

In training young doctors, Sun focused on removing obstacles to their advancement. In just a few years, several were promoted to full professors, and four attending physicians became associate professors.

The “true skills” honed at Fuwai and Anzhen are now serving patients at Delta, solving the most complex challenges of cardiovascular disease. This system allows doctors to focus on their profession, providing patients with the best possible care.

When doctors are fully engaged, patients receive high-quality treatment. This is the harmony and warmth Sun Lizhong has created at Delta Hospital.

ShanghaiDoctor

How do you view the prevention of cardiovascular diseases and public health policies? How should society better address these challenges?

Dr. Sun Lizhong

Previously, we emphasized treatment over prevention, which was short-sighted. In the future, we should focus on prevention rather than waiting until people get sick. Many patients have high blood pressure and high cholesterol. At the national level, we should prioritize health management. Investing in prevention is more cost-effective than treatment. The whole nation should value health management and help people discover and address potential problems early.

ShanghaiDoctor

What areas does Shanghai Delta Cardiovascular Hospital need to improve in the future?

Dr. Sun Lizhong

Delta Hospital has achieved great success in cardiovascular diseases, but the department structure needs improvement. For example, the proportion of major vascular surgeries is too high. In the future, I hope major vascular surgeries will account for about 20% of the total. This will balance discipline development.

As we grow, the proportion of aortic surgeries should decrease, and other specialties, like valve replacement and bypass surgery, should develop. Cardiology should grow faster than cardiac surgery, with cardiology patients outnumbering cardiac surgery patients 3 to 5 times. This will also advance surgical techniques. Delta can learn from hospitals like Fuwai, Anzhen, and Zhongshan to maintain balanced discipline development. I believe Delta's future will be even brighter.

ShanghaiDoctor

You've successfully treated many complex thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysm cases, including pregnant women and critically ill patients. Can you share some memorable cases?

Dr. Sun Lizhong

One case that stands out is from over 20 years ago. A pregnant woman, five months along, suffered acute aortic dissection. It was a critical situation—if we didn't operate, her life was at risk; if we did, the fetus might not survive. After a team discussion, we decided to perform the aortic surgery and deliver the fetus by cesarean section, removing the uterus to control bleeding. After much effort, we saved her life.

ShanghaiDoctor

Besides work, do you have hobbies to relieve stress? How do you balance work and life?

Dr. Sun Lizhong

I relieve stress through exercise—running, walking, and playing ball. Balancing work and life is crucial. Only by maintaining physical and mental health can we better serve patients. I also encourage my colleagues to participate in academic exchanges to improve their skills.