Over 25 years of construction and development, with great efforts, Party Committee, government and medical team of the province have been diligently building a strong healthcare industry. Thereby, people's health care work has been improved in many aspects, meeting the increasing demand of society.
Up to now, the province's medical branch has made important developments.In photo: Doctors place a permanent pacemaker implanted under the skin for a patient at the Provincial General Hospital.
A tough period
Doctor Nguyen Thi Ha Sinh, former Director of the Provincial Department of Health in 1994-2001 period, She recalled the first days of the construction of the province's medical sector. After being sent to study at Ho Chi Minh City University of Medicine and Pharmacy, she was transferred to Song Be General Hospital. In 1994, she held the position of Director of Department of Health of Song Be province, then after 3 years, the province was separated.
“After the separation of the province, medical facilities, equipment, and medicine for medical examination and treatment were limited and suffered deprivation. Especially at the commune level, there was a serious shortage of doctors. Medical branch advised the Provincial People's Committee to issue incentive policies to attract doctors to grassroots level. By the end of 1999, the whole province had 100% of communes with solid medical stations, over 30% of stations having doctors for medical examination and treatment. Medical workers with high professional conscience always try their best to overcome difficulties, use the cure and treatment of patients to encourage each other to strive to complete their assigned tasks," said Dr. Ha Sinh.
Meanwhile, Doctor Nguyen Van Hoa, former Director of the Provincial Rehabilitation Hospital, said that after the re-establishment of the province, health care for people in the province faced many difficulties. The biggest concern of medical industry at that time was that doctors must always innovate their thinking and be active to meet development requirements. At that time, material facilities, equipment and medical instruments from the province to grassroots level suffered deprivation and were seriously downgraded. Moreover, medical staff was thin and insufficient to care for people's health in remote urban areas.
Environmental sanitation and disease prevention control was still weak, health care for mothers and children was not good, malnourished children rate was high. Doctor Hoa said: “Recalling the difficulties during that period, I am so happy about the results achieved by the province in the past 25 years. Many hospitals, clinics, and health stations have been built in communes and wards. The province has high-quality international hospitals such as Hanh Phuc International Hospital, Columbia Hospital, Becamex International Hospital... In particular, the construction project of a 1,500-bed hospital meets the health care demand of people in the area."
Medical socialization breakthrough
In the past 25 years, policies to encourage medical socialization have created favorable conditions for public health facilities to be proactive, promote creativity, and improve the quality of medical examination and treatment services to meet the increasing demand of society. The network of non-public medical facilities has never been as strong as it is today. Specifically, within only five years (2015-2020), Binh Duong put into operation 4 private hospitals and put into use over 1,700 new hospital beds. Healthcare socialization has been enhanced, attracted many participants, the province has now 878 non-public medical establishments.
With flexible policies to promote investment attraction, the province currently has five joint venture and cooperative projects in the medical branch. For example, the hemodialysis project at Provincial General Hospital and 4 joint venture projects at Thuan An City Medical Center (CT-Scanner machine; a medical examination and on-demand inpatient care area; installation of traditional medicine and rehabilitation equipment; installation of immunofluorescence machines and portable arterial blood gas analyzers for emergency department). In addition, the province also has 44 private medical facilities providing vaccination, 5 private facilities performing working environment monitoring. While public non-business units promote financial autonomy, mobilizing resources from the private sector to develop public health facilities is of more concern. On-demand inpatient medical examination and treatment area in the form of socialization has a total investment of 61.6 billion VND and has been put into operation.
According to Van Minh, Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, practical activities, research and evaluation show that the policy to encourage socialization has changed the thinking of public non-business medical units in mobilizing capital and providing professional services without waiting for the budget. The movement of medical socialization has been spreading across the province. In Thu Dau Mot City, over the past five years, 7 projects have been called for socialization investment: medical center, antenatal care clinic equipment, and Methadone treatment facility equipment. Or in Tan Uyen Town, socialization work has been successfully implemented by the town through 1 general hospital, 7 polyclinics, 48 specialist clinics, 12 medical services, and 11 traditional medicine clinics, 1 company medical station, and 411 private pharmacies. From the effective implementation of socialization investment, medical centers have accumulated career development funds to reinvest in material facilities and develop medical human resources, gradually creating trust of the people.
Reported by Hoang Linh - Translated by Ngoc Huynh
