Vietnam - Ministry launches plan to ease patient overloading

The Health Ministry has set up a project to alleviate patient overloading in large hospitals and thereby improve medical service quality. 

The HCMC and Hanoi health authorities and seven leading hospitals will be involved in it, Health Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien said.

“It is a must to drive back patient overloading at hospitals,” the minister said at the conference on strengthening examination and treatment quality held in Hanoi yesterday.

“No country can compare to Vietnam, where two or three patients share a sickbed and where many patients that came to a hospital at 4 am could not be examined until 11 pm,” she said.

In order to combat this overloading the whole sector, especially hospitals’ directors, must put in much more effort, Tien said.

Under the project, the health departments of Hanoi and HCMC and seven leading specialized hospitals, including Bach Mai, Viet Duc, Central Hue, Cho Ray, K, Central Obstetrics, and Central Pediatrics, will take part in the project.

These units are required to boost administrative reforms, re-organize testing services in the “one-door” model, and set up a patient reception unit, among other practical measures.

All specialized hospitals in HCMC and Hanoi must formulate their own plans to combat patient overloading and the local authorities must watch over these plans, she said.

45,000 sickbeds needed

According to the ministry’s project, Bach Mai Hospital in Hanoi will make 150 more sickbeds available this year, and the figure will increase to 3,500 in 2020. At the Central Obstetrics Hospital, also in Hanoi, the number of new sickbeds will be 500.

Cho Ray Hospital, in HCMC, will put its blood transfusion center into operation this year, and will kick off the construction of a 12-storey oncology center in August.

The Hue Central Hospital, in Hue City, will put into operation an international hospital with 300 sickbeds in 2012 and will have 300 more beds by next year for patients suffering from tumors.

The HCMC Health Department will set up a health center in its southern area to serve patients in Nha Be and Can Gio Districts with 5,800 beds, and another center in its western area for people in Binh Chanh, Binh Tanh and Tan Phu districts.

The agency will also build a third center in Cu Chi District, north of the city, with 7,400 beds, and a 200-bed general hospital in the Thu Thiem New Urban Area and the Hiep Phuoc Port Urban area.

Meanwhile, Hanoi will build a general hospital with 1,000 beds, a pediatrics hospital with 500 beds and two more general hospitals in Gia Lam District and Me Linh District with 200 beds each.

The ministry targets a rate of 25-27 sickbeds at State-owned hospitals per 10,000 inhabitants by 2015, compared to just 20.5/10,000 at present.

The ministry called on the investors of hospital projects on which work started a long time ago, particularly cases like the K Hospital, which has been under construction for 10 years, to step up progress to complete their projects soon, she said.

According to the ministry’s calculation, the country needs to have 45,000 more sickbeds by 2015 if it wants to reverse patient overloading. However, finding the investment for such an expansion remains a challenge that needs to be overcome.

Hospital fees rise, doctor’s allowances up

At the conference, the ministry also announced new hospital fees for 447 health services, which are expected to be applied on April 15, 2012.

Accordingly, an examination at a Grade 1 hospital, where a doctor is supposed to examine only 35 patients per day, will cost VND20,000 (US$0.96). Currently some doctors examine as many as 100-120 people per day.

The new fees have been calculated to include the expenses of purchasing new medical equipment to improve the quality of examination and treatment.

Many hospital representatives said that they would not be able improve the examination and treatment quality if their hospitals’ infrastructure and equipment were not improved.

Along with a rise in hospital fees will be an increase in reimbursement to health workers, including doctors, at State-owned health facilities.

As for doctors, their allowances will increase by 3-4 times from the current rates. For example, a doctor can make VND280,000 ($13.5) for performing a special operation, much more than the current rate of VND70,000.

Regarding support for poor patients without health insurance, Nguyen Hoang Long, deputy head of the ministry’s Finance Planning Department, said the government will pay 70 percent of the health insurance premium for such people so that they can have health insurance cards.

TUOI TRE

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