Doctors at the Central Acupuncture Hospital treating a patient. Many public hospitals in Hanoi have tried to expand their outpatient treatment services.

No more patient stampedes after private hospitals force their public counterparts to clean up their act.

But unlike several years ago, patients not longer have to bounce around a hospital getting paperwork authenticated and fetching test results. In the past, patients resorted to pushing and shoving to be the first to get medical treatment.

With more and more patients opting for the better services offered at private hospitals, public hospitals have simplified paperwork and treatment procedures in a bid to lure customers back.

People still have to wait but they are no longer required to shuttle back and forth inside Hanoi’s state-run Thanh Nhan public hospital to get examination results. Instead, hospital employees assist with test results and paperwork authentication.

“Though the hospital has to handle thousands of patients per day, all relevant paperwork procedures are completed within the day,” said Dang Van Chinh, Thanh Nhan Hospital director.

Examinations are also completed with results sent back to their patients within an hour at the maximum, Chinh said.

He added that outpatient treatment services had been expanded to around 7,400 people with chronic diseases like diabetes, asthma and hypertension.

The Central Obstetric Hospital too has improved the outpatient treatment services in a bid to ease the patient overload. One year after introducing expanded outpatient services, the hospital is able to handle from 30 to 50 cases daily,

The improvement has delivered solid results and garnered keen support.

“The hospital should continue to strengthen such a service which has been very convenient for needy patients,” a Hoang Mai District resident told Thanh Nien.

A patient at the Hanoi-based Bach Mai Hospital said, “I have seen major improvements at the hospital compared with several years ago. I am not jostled or charged when queuing up any more.”

“My mother got priority for her treatment after examination results showed her condition had deteriorated. We were very surprised and moved by that,” said the daughter of Hanoian kidney patient Pham Thi M.

Examination results at Bach Mai Hospital are also sent back to their patients within the day, even within the same morning, the hospital management said.

Nguyen Huu Thanh, director of the Central Acupuncture Hospital, said a compliment-based reward system has spurred his staff to improve patient care and thus improve hospital services.

“Doctors and nurses who are complimented by their patients receive bonuses,” Thanh said, saying this has helped reduce complaints from patients over the past year.

The hospital has also started keeping a close watch on prescriptions written by its doctors in an attempt to avoid doctors giving referrals to drugstores in exchange for kickbacks, Thanh said.

The Ministry of Health has said major state-owned hospitals have been able to enlist around VND3 trillion (US$176.5 million) from the private sector to upgrade their facilities to reduce patient waiting times.

All state hospital authorities promised they would make patient satisfaction a leading priority in further improving their services.

Unresolved roadblocks

The head of the Health Ministry’s Medical Service Administration, Ly Ngoc Kinh, admitted that the continuing overload of patients has worsened in many central hospitals, including Bach Mai and Central Children’s hospitals in Hanoi, and Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City.

Kinh said many patients have still shared a bed in these hospitals. At one Hanoi hospital, up to eight patients shared a bed, a local newspaper reported.

Health authorities attributed such a patient overload to the fact that locals didn’t trust district- and province-level healthcare, favoring major city hospitals instead.

Minister of Health Nguyen Quoc Trieu recently announced some 45,000 extra hospital beds by 2010 and another 60,000 by 2020.

The low public hospital salaries mean that the nation’s best doctors are offered jobs at private hospitals, he said.

Reported by Nam Son - Minh Ngoc