Thousands of people in China have had banned Alzheimer’s surgery — SkimNews
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- China's National Health Commission banned DCLVA surgery for Alzheimer's outside research settings in June 2025, citing lack of evidence on safety and effectiveness, after an estimated 2,000+ people had undergone the procedure
- Xie Qingping at Hangzhou Qiushi Hospital developed DCLVA from a routine treatment for chronically swollen limbs, reporting in 2024 that 50 Alzheimer's patients had the surgery, including a bedbound man seen walking 8 months post-op
- The procedure had spread to roughly 300 public and private hospitals across China by May 2025, often performed by plastic surgeons for fees ranging from tens of thousands to several hundred thousand yuan
- Small US and Singaporean trials presented at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference in London suggest DCLVA is safe for up to six months, with the Singaporean trial finding cognitive improvements in 2 of 4 participants
- Hui-Sheng Chen at the General Hospital of Shenyang Military Region is leading an ongoing randomized trial comparing DCLVA against sham surgery, recruiting 50 people with mild to moderate Alzheimer's, with results expected next year
- Researchers including Steven Proulx and Per Kristian Eide have raised ethical concerns about sham surgery in frail elderly patients and questioned whether the small observed improvements are substantial enough for families to notice
Why it matters: Over 2,000 patients in China paid up to several hundred thousand yuan for a surgery with no controlled-trial evidence of efficacy before regulators banned it in June 2025. The episode illustrates how a single viral before-and-after video — plus routine plastic-surgery infrastructure — helped an unproven procedure reach roughly 300 hospitals in months.
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