The Department of Anesthesiology, Union Hospital of Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology has a long history. It was established in 1955 by Professor Junjie Liu, a famous anesthesiologist in China and the winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Chinese Association of Anesthesiologists. In 2007, it became the only national clinical trial center for anesthetics in Hubei Province. In 2007, it was awarded a national key discipline by the Ministry of Education, and in 2010, it was supported by a national key clinical specialty project of the Ministry of Health.

The Department of Anesthesiology in Union Hospital of Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology has world-classed clinical anesthesia technology, hardware facilities and a sound working environment. Clinical anesthesia is consisted with 11 sub-professional groups, such as general surgical anesthesia, emergency and operating room anesthesia, anesthesia resuscitation and postoperative analgesia, obstetrics and gynecology anesthesia, and pain treatment etc. There are 119 modern operation rooms completing more than 120,000 operations annually. The department has been ranked at top level in critical obstetrics anesthesia, walkable labor analgesia, difficult airway management, anesthesia visualization technology, heart transplantation/cardiopulmonary transplantation/heart-liver transplantation, anesthesia for complex cardiac congenital surgery in young and low-weight children, super-elderly patients.

The Department of Anesthesiology makes good achievements in scientific research, and currently undertakes more than 60 national or provincial projects, including more than 40 projects from the Natural Science Foundation of China. The research directions mainly involve the following five aspects: (1) ARDS and ventilation-related lung injury; (2) Cardiovascular Anesthesia and its basic research; (3) Research on the mechanism of anesthesia; (4) Liquid treatment of perioperative and critical patients; (5) Pain treatment. It has won the provincial technological invention and scientific and technological progress awards many times, including one first prize for scientific and technological progress in Hubei Province and one first prize for technological invention in Hubei Province. In addition, it has won first, second and third prizes of various provincial and municipal awards and got more than 14 national patents. From 2006 to 2019, more than 150 papers have been published and indexed by SCI.

The Department of Anesthesiology is a domestic first-class and internationally renowned clinical, teaching, research and training center of anesthesiology. Professor Xiangdong Chen is thedirector of Institute of Anesthesia and Critical Care, chairman and professor of Department of Anesthesiology of Union Hospital of Tongji Medical College. Professor Chen is the Vice-President of Chinese Association of Anesthesiologists and Standing Committee of Chinese Society of Anesthesiology. He is the editor for Journal of Clinical Anesthesiology, International Journal of Anesthesiology and Resuscitation and a reviewer for major journals. Professor Shanglong Yao, the director of the Institute, has been awarded the title of Young and Middle-aged Expert with Outstanding Contributions by the Ministry of Health. There are currently 189 employees in the department of anesthesiology, including 9 professors, 17 associate professors, 61 attending doctors, 72 resident doctors, 5 doctoral tutors, 9 master tutors, and 7 foreign visiting professors. The Department of Anesthesiology has an excellent talent team. So far, it has trained 155 doctoral students and 331 postgraduates. It receives more than 50 continuing education doctors and more than 40 standardized training residents every year. It is the largest professional standardized training center for anesthesia in China.

More than 60 people in the Department of Anesthesiology participated in compiling the standardized training textbooks such as Anesthesiology, Modern Anesthesiology, Basic Techniques of Clinical Anesthesia, Clinical Anesthesiology. In addition, the team of Shanglong Yao translated Kaplan Cardiac Anesthesiology (Fifth Edition), Principles and Practice of Extracorporeal Circulation, Pediatric Anesthesiology, and Translation Miller Anesthesiology.

The Department of Anesthesiology in Union Hospital is a national key discipline of the Ministry of Education, the chairman of the Anesthesiologist Branch of the Chinese Medical Doctor Association, and the vice-chairman unit of the Anesthesiology Branch of the Chinese Medical Association. It is supported by the Ministry of Health's clinical key specialty project. For five consecutive years, it has been ranked among the top five in the Fudan version of "China Hospital Specialty Reputation Rankings".