Overview

Established in October 1956, Wuhan Mental Health Center (WMHC) was formerly known as Wuhan Psychiatric Hospital and officially changed its name to WMHC in 2008 with the addition of an alternative name of Wuhan Hospital of Psychotherapy. WMHC gained the name of Wuhan Mental Health Center/The 9th Clinical School Affiliated to Tongji Medical College of HUST in September 2016 and Wuhan Hospital of Psychotherapy affiliated to China University of Geosciences. Presently, the Center has built a “One Hospital Three Areas” development landscape, namely, “psychological health in Erqi Area, mental health in Liujiaoting Area and integrated rehabilitation treatment in Dongxihu Area”, making it a modernized psychiatric hospital integrating medical care, teaching, research, prevention and rehabilitation.

The Center covers an area of over 50 mu with a total built-up area of 65,000 square meters. With 1,100 beds, 20 clinical departments and 7 medical technology departments, the Center has an annual outpatient service capacity of nearly 400,000 and 15,000 annual discharged patients.  Presently, the Center is staffed by 792 employees, including 652 health technical personnel, 87 persons with advanced technical titles, 148 master's degree holders, 27 doctoral degree holders, and more than 40 personnel recognized as experts with outstanding contributions, Huang He Talents and individuals enjoying special governmental allowances.

The Center operates 1 provincial key clinical specialty, 2 municipal key clinical specialties and 3 key public health specialties. With sophisticated subspecialties, the Center commands a leading position in terms of comprehensive strengths among nationwide psychiatric specialties and is a member of the Standing Committee of Psychiatric Health, Chinese Preventive Medicine Association, and national member of Society of Psychiatry of Chinese Medical Association and Society of Psychiatrists of Chinese Medical Doctor Association. The Center has been ranked 4th in terms of Specialty Reputation among psychiatric specialty hospitals in central China for 4 consecutive years and 16th place in nationwide psychiatric specialties in terms of 2020 Science and Technology Evaluation Metrics (STEM). In 2021, the Center was ranked the 7th in 2021 Internet Influence Ranking of Psychiatric Specialties in Chinese Hospitals. Specialties like obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and depressive disorder diagnosis and treatment, as well as psychological crisis intervention, are ranked top in China.

The Center assumes responsibilities on a municipal level including quality control of psychiatric medicine, prevention and treatment of psychiatric conditions, technical guidance for social psychology, comprehensive management of patients with severe psychiatric disorders, psychological crisis intervention and assistance. The Center was the first institution to launch the community psychiatric disorder prevention and treatment program in central and western areas of Hubei Province. With a psychiatric disorder prevention and control system featuring an architecture of “Municipal Psychiatric Health Center - District Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - Community Health Care Service Centers (Township Health Centers), the Center pioneers the management model where long-acting injectables (LAIs) are applied in treating schizophrenia patients at community levels, continues to carry out treatment and rescue for patients with mental disorder and provides guidance for the construction of community rehabilitation institutions across the city. Focusing on psychological health, the Center has opened a green channel for higher education psychological health services and actively offers psychological aid for victims of major emergent public incidents within and without the province. Further, the Center has taken the lead in establishing the Wuhan Association of Social Psychological Service Industry to build up a psychological health service model encompassing “society, families, schools and medical institutions”. The Center also led the establishment of the Hubei Psychological Health Specialty Alliance and Wuhan Psychiatric Specialty Alliance to dispatch top-notch experts and backbones to aid programs, advancing the flow of quality medical resources to the downstream market and grassroots healthcare service capabilities at a provincial or municipal level.

Adhering to the operating principle of “Science, Teaching and Talent-driven Prosperity”, the Center is an independent master's program recruitment unit for Huazhong University of Science and Technology and the China University of Geosciences. In the meantime, the Center also serves as the teaching base to cultivate graduate students in alliances with Wuhan University, Central China Normal University, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Anhui Medical University and Jianghan University. Presently, the Center has 2 doctoral supervisors and 22 master's degree supervisors. At the Center, more than 100 research projects have been approved over the past 5 years, including 2 projects sponsored by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and 4 youth projects. 138 SCI papers have been published as first or correspondence authors, including 6 papers having an impact factor over 10. The Center has been the first normalized training base for psychiatric clinical pharmacy among nationwide psychiatric specialty hospitals. The Center has hosted worldwide influential training programs like the China American Psychoanalytic Series Training, making great contributions to the development of psychological health and talent cultivation in China.

In recent years, the Center has been honored as the National Advanced Unit for Ideological and Political Work in the Healthcare System, National Advanced Unit in Judicial Authentication, Hubei Provincial Advanced Unit in Healthcare, Hubei Provincial Civilized Unit in Disease Control and Prevention, Wuhan Municipal Examplar Home of Employees, Hubei Provincial Advanced Group for the Fight against COVID-19 and Wuhan May Day Labor Medal.