Taipei City Hospital

Radiology:

1. Division of Radiology:

The Department of Radiology is equipped with state-of-the-art medical imaging facilities including Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Computer Tomography (CT), ultrasonography, angiography, fluoroscopy, digital mammography, and general digital X-Ray. This department employs seventeen consultant radiologists, each with a specific field of interest and expertise. Their sub-specializations include interventional radiology, neuoradiology, gastrointestinal radiology, breast imaging, musculoskeletal radiology, genitourinary radiology, gynecological radiology, and chest radiology. Taipei City Hospital uses an integrated PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication System), which stores images on a central server, which enables access of all medical images from any of the ten branches.

2. Division of Radiation Oncology:

Special facilities available now include the most modernized linear accelerator, stereotactic radiosurgery, 3D treatment planning system, Three-Dimensional conformal Radiotherapy and aMultileaf Collimator, The newest IMRT equipment will be installed soon.

3. Division of Nuclear Medicine:
What is Nuclear Medicine
Nuclear medicine is a branch of medicine and medical imaging that uses unsealed radioactive substances for diagnosis and therapy. These substances consist of radionuclides, or pharmaceuticals that have been labeled with radionuclides (radiopharmaceuticals). In diagnosis, radioactive substances are administered to patients and the radiation emitted is measured. The majority of these diagnostic tests involve the formation of an image using a gamma camera. Imaging may also be referred to as radionuclide imaging or nuclear scintigraphy. Other diagnostic tests use probes to acquire measurements from parts of the body, or counters for the measurement of samples taken from the patient. In therapy, radionuclides are administered to treat disease or provide palliative pain relief. For example, administration of iodine-131 is often used for the treatment of thyrotoxicosis and thyroid cancer.
Nuclear medicine imaging tests differ from most other imaging modalities in that the tests primarily show the physiological functioning of the system being investigated as opposed to the anatomy.

Diagnostic tests
Diagnostic tests in nuclear medicine exploit the way that the body handles substances differently when there is disease or pathology present. The radionuclide introduced into the body is often chemically bound to a complex that acts characterisically within the body; this is commonly known as a tracer. In the presence of disease, a tracer will often be distributed around the body and/or be processed differently. Many tracer complexes have been developed in order to image or treat many different organs, glands, and physiological processes. The types of tests can be split into two broad groups: in-vivo and in-vitro:

• In-vivo tests are measurements directly involving the patient. By far the most common are gamma camera imaging investigations, although non-imaging probes are also used to measure the levels of radioactivity within a patient.
  The in-vivo tests available from our departments include:
  Bone scanning, myocardial perfusion scanning, lung scanning, renal scanning, brain scanning, gallium scanning, thyroid scanning, parathyroid scanning, adrenal scanning, liver scanning etc.
• In-vitro tests are measurements of samples taken from the patient (e.g. blood, urine, breath). The tests are also known as radioimmunoassays.
  The RIA tests available from our departments include:
  Tumor markers: CEA, AFP, CA-153 etc. Hepatitis markers: HBsAg, HBeAg, AntiHBc, AntiHBs etc. Hormones: T3, T4, fT4, TSH etc.

Pathology:
4. Division of Anatomical Pathology:

The division consists of the surgical pathology and cytology. The division provides diagnostic services related to surgical specimens, biopsies, and autopsy. The surgical pathology department now has five local branches at located at the different branches of the hospital. Each branch has one pathologist and two to three medical technologists. All of them provide diagnostic services related to surgical biopsies, cytopathology, and frozen section for intra-operative consultion and during autopsy. We participate in many clinical conferences and have good communication with clinicians; this is in order to get a consensus for best treatment planning for our patients. We also hold journal meetings and slide meetings to educate our members and maintain the quality of their diagnostic skills. After the union of all Taipei municipal hospitals, surgical pathology will become one core lab in order to provide better diagnostic services for our citizens and promotion of our specialists.

5. Division of Clinical Pathology and Laboratory Medicine:

The Division of Clinical Pathology and Laboratory Medicine is equipped with sophisticated facilities and instruments. The core laboratory was established inApril 2005. All the specimens for routine biochemical, serological and immunological examination as well as cultures for microbiological examination Are collected from each branch of the Taipei City Hospital and transfered to the Central Laboratory.

Introduction
The Taipei City Hospital Clinical Laboratories are a group of laboratories dedicated to providing comprehensive and high quality laboratory services for the patients and clinical teams of Taipei City Hospital. The laboratories include a central core laboratory and branch laboratories that are located at the ten branch hospitals. Our laboratories are equipped with sophisticated automated instruments and integrated bioinformatical system as well as being staffed by highly skilled technologists. These support a 24-hour service and provide rapid and accurate laboratory examinations that meet the demands associated with excellent patient care. We offer an extensive menu of laboratory tests, including the up-to-date diagnostic testing using new state-of- the-art biotechnology systems. We participate in the survey programs provided by the College of American Pathologists and the results are always excellent. We established a laboratory automation system (LAS) in 2005, which integrated the different fields of samples, as well as providing multi-site integration.

Mission
To provide reliable, useful, fast laboratory reports and services for patients, physicians and clinical team members
To manage transfusion reactions and provide laboratory consultations for physicians and clinical team members
To solving the discrepancies between the laboratory reports and clinical conditions

Organization
The professional staff includes: 3 clinical Pathologists, 152 medical technologists, and clerical personnel.

Branch laboratories:
These provide immediate laboratory services as well as the routine blood, stool, urine and body fluid analyses.

Core laboratory:
We employ a bar-code system for specimen identification. The Core laboratory is a highly automated laboratory with high-volume of testing capacity and a short turn-around time that can provide efficient laboratory testing for all branch hospitals. Immediately after finishing the tests, our integrated laboratory information system can directly provide the laboratory results to all branch hospitals.

Sections:
The laboratory consists of seven sections, namely, biochemistry, serology and immunology, microbiology, hematology, the emergency laboratory, the blood bank, virology and molecular biology.