Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - Vietnam is one of the few countries witha complete healthcare network which had been widely expanded to villagesto provide primary treatment to local people, Deputy Minister of Health DoXuan Tuyen has said.

Themodel had gained interest from many countries around the world, hesaid.

Thegrassroots healthcare network in Vietnam had 1,400 hospitals, 180,000 bedsand more than 11,800 clinics.

Thetraining and development of human resources for grassroots clinicshad also gained attention, with most having a doctor, obstetrician ormidwife.  

In2019, the health sector launched a training course to transfer technologyand improve the professional capacity of health workers.

Aspart of the course, doctors and nurses from central hospitals in Hanoi and HCMCity are being rotated to support their colleagues at grassroots clinics.Young doctors have been sent to work in mountainous and rural areas under theministry’s pilot Project 585 since 2013.

Underthe project, 354 young doctors in the fields of obstetrics, paediatrics,imaging diagnosis, anesthesia, emergency resuscitation, infectiousness andtraditional medicine have been trained. Of them, 151 have volunteered to workin 51 poor districts around the country and 195 are stillcompleting their training before moving to assigned areas.

Tuyensaid the ministry’s efforts to provide healthcare had contributed toimproving the quality of medical examinations and treatment ata grassroots level, and people had easy access to local medicalservices.

Inparticular, the grassroots healthcare system had contributed in thefight against the COVID-19 pandemic thanks to the infectious diseasesupervision system, which had stopped the spread of the disease in thecommunity.

Theministry has been piloting family medical plans at 26 clinics in eightprovinces and cities, while medical technology is being constantly updatedand transferred from central to local levels.

Notably,care workers have made much progress after five years of reform.

The2019 Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI)showed that the citizen’s satisfaction index on public healthcarehad increased from 1.92 in 2017 to 1.96 in 2018.

Only0.4 percent of patients in district public hospitals reported they had to bribemedical staff to get better care. That figure in 2017 stood at 9 percent.

Theinpatient satisfaction index in 2018 reached 80.6 percent, backed up by asurvey conducted by Oxfam Vietnam.

Tofurther improve the quality and efficiency of grassroots healthcare services,Tuyen said the ministry had launched a five-year project toupgrade the system in 13 cities and provinces.

Theproject has a total investment capital of more than 126 million USD. Of that, 80million USD is from the World Bank, 25 million USD is from non-refundableaid and the rest is from the Government.

Underthe project, 138 clinics will be built and 337 clinics will be upgraded andprovided with medical equipment. Health workers will be trained before workingin these clinics.

ActingMinister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long said the ministry focuses ongrassroots healthcare in order to serve the people in a timely manner.

“Theministry will connect provincial, district and commune health clinicswith remote medical examinations and treatment. A doctor at a centralhospital will support at least four health workers in provincial facilities,four health workers in district facilities and two health workers incommunal clinics,” he said.

Theministry also planned to launch a remote medical examination and treatmentproject connecting 1,000 medical facilities to help people access the best healthcareservices, he said./.