Shanghai's Renji Hospital earns China's first DNV certification for blood purification

Shanghai's Renji Hospital has become China's first medical institution to acquire a DNV certification for blood purification care in early 2026, further bolstering the capacity of the city's international, high-end medical services.

For travelers managing uremia, a condition requiring regular blood purification, Shanghai has become a far more accessible destination. Renji's Blood Purification Center has earned the international certification that validates the center meets rigorous global standards for patient safety and care quality.

"This is my first time in Shanghai, China. It was such a straightforward and smooth booking. The doctors and the nurses have all been great. I felt at ease. I've had three treatments here. Coming to Shanghai has really shown me that I can really still live and experience the world," said a patient from London, the capital city of the United Kingdom.

Renji's doctors say they have invested years of efforts to obtain the DNV certification -- accreditation from Det Norske Veritas, a Norway-based international assurance organization that evaluates healthcare quality and patient safety standards globally.

"For 30 years, we saw a growing demand from international patients -- tourists, business travelers, even an engineer during the World Expo 2010. They needed hemodialysis but also required assurance that our quality met global norms. This drove us to pursue DNV certification. It was a multi-year process of fundamental upgrades, digitizing our entire system from handwritten records," said Gu Leyi, director of the Nephrology Department.

The DNV standard requires management protocols, traceable medical records, and standardized procedures to guarantee patient safety.

"Our DNV-certified process begins well before travel, with a thorough pre-assessment with the patient's home doctors and screening for infectious diseases. We arrange treatment frequency, allocate time slots, and prepare specific rooms based on the patient's prescription. Upon arrival, we re-test on-site. During each session, we provide multilingual communication support and full companionship. This system builds mutual trust with patients, and we're seeing many of them happy to return," said Lu Renhua, director of the Blood Purification Center.

Renji's blood purification center has three campuses across Shanghai and has the capacity to treat nearly 200 patients every day.

"Booking is through our international clinic website or by emails. DNV certification improves patients' access. Our goal is to replicate a patient's home treatment for a smooth transition. After each session, we provide a full report in English. The certification also facilitates direct payment from international insurance providers. Our weekend and evening shifts are able to fit into their travel itineraries, making Shanghai's international outreach more complete and multi-dimensional," Gu said.

Shanghai's Renji Hospital earns China's first DNV certification for blood purification

Space-bred cranberry seedlings, carried into space aboard multiple missions and nurtured through two years of greenhouse breeding and acclimatization, have begun field transplantation at a plantation in northeast China.

The seedlings were carried into space aboard China's Shenzhou-14, Shenzhou-16 and Shijian-19 missions. After returning to Earth, they underwent a rigorous two-year period of greenhouse breeding and acclimatization before being transferred to open fields for large-scale management and monitoring. Now, they are being planted in fields in Fuyuan, Heilongjiang Province.

Cheng Zhengxin, a technical engineer at the plantation, explained the meticulous transplantation procedures needed to safeguard the delicate seedlings' superior traits and maximize their survival rates in the open fields.

"Now is the ideal season for transplantation. We are moving the space-bred cranberry seedlings from greenhouses into open fields for large-scale management. During the process, we must keep the original roots and soil intact without damaging the root systems or branches. After transplantation, timely watering is needed to keep the soil moist but without water accumulation," she said.

Regarding the future direction of the breeding program, the plantation's general manager Li Feng explained the vision for domestic cultivation.

"The seedlings we are working with come from our space breeding program and radiation simulation experiments conducted with the Harbin Institute of Technology. In the future, we will continue field observation and variety comparison experiments to cultivate cranberry varieties suitable for growing in China and help fill the gap in domestic cranberry germplasm resources," he said.

Cranberries used to be sourced mainly from North America, but Fuyuan City has made breakthroughs since 2014 in the production of cranberries via cooperation among the government, companies, research institutions and colleges. Once deserted experimental fields in the city have been transformed into the biggest planting base for cranberries in China. Recent years saw Fuyuan further extending the industrial chain of cranberries to enrich the product line ranging from juice and ice cream to beer and cosmetics, which now serves as a major cash cow to the local economy.

Space-bred cranberry seedlings transplanted into fields in northeast China