Gansu province is piloting a new program () that would put some 2500 medical professionals on China’s various micro-blogging services. Details of the plan are included in the below.
I am skeptical that this will provide much value to Guansu residents.
Micro-blogging and text-messages have proven useful in the delivery of basic public health information and in clinical practice marketing. Mobile technology can also support stressed healthcare systems by making it easier for isolated regions to access public health information or by helping a small number of medical professionals follow up with a greater number of patients. There is no reason to believe, however, that mobile technologies can replace or cover up failings in the infrastructure of overstressed systems. Mobile tech is a support technology not a replacement for infrastructure.
Therefore, it is a bad sign that Liu Weizhong, director of the Guansu provincial health department, has said that the goal of the Gansu project is to address the problem of “too many patients” in China. By formulating Guansu’s problem as one of “too many patients” and not of too few medical personnel, Mr. Weizhong takes focus off the fact that Guansu’s main issue, like the issue in most of China, is a lack of human resources. In China the number of patients per doctor is approximately 1000 in most areas outside of the major cities (see picture above), but this figure is much higher if one does not count the doctors who only finished 2-4 year medical schools.
With the focus shifted to the patient it sure sounds like this micro-blogging initiative is being sold as a sort of cure-all solution for a system that suffers from understaffed and underpaid health personnel. Unfortunately its apt to do the opposite as already over-worked medical professionals are apt to get even more busy, assuming they take this initiative at all seriously (their lack of interest in the program is another likely way that it will get derailed). I continue to think that any health reform in China has to start with the medical workers who are . Only when doctors are better paid will other types of reform become possible, until then programs like this one in Guansu will be little more than media headlines.
Thank you for making the above image available to us.
Health workers in northwest Gansu province have been asked by the local health administration to provide health advice and related services to the public via China’s Twitter-like micro blogs, which now have 195 million users.
In a month, at least 2,500 local medical personnel of both Western and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) are expected to open micro blog accounts at Sina Weibo and Tencent, China’s top two micro blog account providers, said Liu Weizhong, director of the provincial health department.
“It’s a brand-new channel to better serve the public on health. The public can become more familiar with health issues and take better care of themselves through having more accessible interaction with doctors on micro blogs,” he told China Daily on Friday.
Many Chinese complain about the high cost and availability of medical treatment.
“At the heart of the problem is the huge number of patients. Medical workers should promote health education, primarily disease prevention information, to help people stay healthy,” he said.
An online notice issued by the provincial health department on Thursday also asks local doctors to use micro blogs to guide people seeking treatment, to recommend suitable specialists, to solicit public opinion on local health issues, and to collect and inform the public on tried-and-tested, safe TCM remedies.
“So far, the call for voluntary participation has been well received by doctors,” Liu said.
However, an internal-medicine doctor surnamed Xu, in Lanzhou, capital of Gansu province, said he welcomed the idea but couldn’t guarantee he could spend enough time on a micro blog or always give timely answers to patients’ questions.
“I have to see more than 20 patients a day,” he said.
In response, Liu said his department will organize a special group of micro-bloggers to ensure that there are always some doctors available to answer questions.
Some physicians are concerned about potential medical disputes.
Medical treatment is a highly personal, precise, and demanding issue, and the public should remain cautious about online health information, said an official with the Ministry of Health who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Liu emphasized, however, that the micro blog service concerns mainly health instructions and advice rather than medical treatment.
“And we’ll draft guidelines and regulations to manage the platform well,” he added.
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