Patients benefiting from unified healthcare systems

The number of cross-regional hospital visits in China — a sign of uneven distribution of medical resources — has fallen significantly in recent years thanks to efforts made to ramp up overall public healthcare capacity, health officials said during a news conference on Tuesday.

Zhu Hongbiao, an official at the National Health Commission's department of healthcare reform, said that China has so far set up 13 national medical centers specializing in different fields of medicine, 125 national-level regional medical centers and 114 provincial-level regional medical facilities.

National medical centers represent top-notch diagnosis and treatment levels in a specific medical field, while regional medical centers are tasked with providing patients in different regions with quality services closer to their homes.

Zhu added that 81 cities across the nation have launched pilot programs to unite urban hospitals under one coordinated system, and county-level authorities have pushed forward reforms to link local medical facilities together to offer consistent healthcare services for residents.

Xing Ruoqi, an official at the commission's department of medical administration, said that local authorities have also improved hospital appointment systems, streamlined procedures for transferring patients and set up novel outpatient clinics in anesthesia, pain relief and health management to make the treatment process more convenient for patients and to meet their diversified demands.