Lumbar spine section was founded in 1991. After 17 years of development, there are totally 8 staffs, which are 3 professors, 2 associate professors, 1 attending doctor, and 2 residents. The chief of lumbar spine section is Prof. Zhongqiang Chen, who also served as the president of Peking University Third Hospital, mentor of postgraduate student, vice chairman of Chinese Orthopedic Association, associate chief editor of Chinese Journal of Surgery, and the chairman of AOSpine China chapter.
　　In the early 1950s, the lumbar discectomy a procedure was began to perform in the department. To date, approximately 10,000 cases of lumbar spine surgery have been performed. Since the establishment of lumbar spine section, a huge amount of research works been done clinically and basically, including lumbar disc herniation, lumbar canal stenosis, lumbar spondylolisthesis, lumbar degenerative scoliosis, thoracolumbar fracture, lumbar discogenic pain, thoracolumbar deformities and stenosis of thoracal cannal (OPLL,OLF). In the early 1990s, we were the pioneer in performing percutaneous laser disc decompression (PLDD) in Asia. We also were the first in China to systematically discribed foramen and lateral foramen lumbar disc protrusion, and perform the discectomy via lateral pars approach and got a good results. In the field of treatment of degenerative lumbar disease, such as lumbar disc herniation, lumbar canal stenosis, lumbar spondylolisthesis, lumbar degenerative scoliosis, especially revision procedures, we accumulated plenty of experience, and have the top-ranking surgical technique and results. Nowadays, regarding the concept of semi-rigid fixation technique, we performed lumbar artificial disc replacement and inversions process fixation. These procedures relieved the pain while preserving the segment motion, which was the new method for surgical treatment of degenerative lumbar diseases.
　　In the past years, we did a lot of clinical and basic research for kyphosis of thoracolumbar spine. We had achieved over 100 cases of surgical treatment for old traumatic, old tuberculous and congenital kyphosis of thoracolumbar spine. We have illuminated the treating principle and surgical method choice in detail. Basing on the traditional posterior closing wedge osteotomy, anterior decompression and correction, and combined osteotomy correction, we designed simple posterior approach open-closing wedge osteotomy correction and simple posterior approach Segmental resection osteotomy and dual axial rotation correction technique, which is a great innovation for surgical treatment of severe kyphosis of thoracolumbar spine, especially for kyphosis with cobb angle over 60o. For kyphosis which was over 90o, simple posterior approach Segmental resection osteotomy and dual axial rotation correction technique has showed a very good result. As a breakthrough in the kyphosis correction surgery, these modified techniques were widely spread in many national and international meeting, and got good remarks.
　　We also did lots of research work in thoracical canal stenosis, including ossification of thoracical ligamentum flavum, ossification of thoracical posterior longitudinal ligament, and thoracical disc protrusion. We described in details the pathogenesis, diagnosis, and radiological characteristics. We firstly suggested the posterior open-wall of theoretical canal in treating theoretical canal stenosis, and got a good result. Currently, we are on the top in this area in China.
　　In these several years, we have done a lot of research in clinical treatment of theoretical canal stenosis, thoracolumbar disc herniations, thoracolumbar kyphosis, severe lumbar spondylolisthesis, lumbar scoliosis, degenerative disc disease, and lumbar instability. We also did basic research such as tissue engineering of bone, osteoporosis, molecular biology, and biomechanics. We got national natural science fund, national high technology fund and other funds, which was totally over 10,000,000 RMB. From 2000, we have published nearly 200 papers, including 10 more SCI papers.
　　In conclusion, we have been among the top level in the treatment of thoracolumbar and lumbar spine diseases after nearly two decades efforts.