On February 8, 2023, the inspector of the Department of Health of Ho Chi Minh City said that he had deployed 3 surprise inspection teams to observe the compliance with the provisions of the Law of the private clinics around the area with information about the current situation. ‘medical stork’ statue.
Unexpected inspection results of 5 clinics, including 1 general clinic and 4 private specialist clinics, showed that there was one clinic showing signs of “stork” activity to lure patients to medical examination and treatment. It is a clinic specializing in Internal Medicine (near the old Ho Chi Minh City Oncology Hospital) in Binh Thanh District.
The remaining clinics have not detected any “stork” signs, but all have violations of specialized regulations during medical examination and treatment activities.
Inspectors of Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health are coordinating with relevant agencies and units to handle establishments and individuals that commit violations according to the provisions of the Law, especially strictly dealing with departments. There are signs of association with “storks” at medical examination and treatment facilities.
In fact, the problem of “storks” at hospitals is always a hot issue of the last-line general and specialized hospitals of Ho Chi Minh City. This is a challenge to the work of ensuring security, order and safety for patients and has a significant impact on efforts to build a civilized, modern and compassionate service environment at hospitals in the area. city.
Although the health sector and the police have made many concerted efforts to prevent “hospital storks”, it is clearly not enough to deter this evil in hospitals.
At the Scientific Conference “Strengthening the work of ensuring security and order at medical facilities in Ho Chi Minh City” on December 16, 2022 organized by the Ho Chi Minh City Police and the Department of Health, Missing General Le Hong Nam – Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Public Security commented: “Besides the results achieved in the work of coordination to ensure security and order, overcrowding, crowded people at hospitals, Medical facilities in Ho Chi Minh City in the past time have been a condition that gives rise to complicated activities, causing insecurity and disorder such as theft, “storks” of medical examination and treatment, competition for breeder services. sick, ambulance carrying sick …”.
Currently, the number of medical examination and treatment at specialized and general hospitals in the city is recovering and rapidly increasing again after the COVID-19 epidemic has been controlled, the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health said. stability control. When the number of visits increases, it is also the time for the “stork” problem to recur.
Accordingly, the Department of Health requires all hospitals and medical examination and treatment facilities to review and strengthen the activities of the health care facility security team, strengthen coordination with the local police force to ensure the safety of the health care facilities. ensure security and order in the most crowded areas, especially the medical examination registration area. At the same time, it is required that hospitals promote the implementation of remote medical examination registration applications; strengthen communication for patients to be wary of “storks” and especially strengthen inspection, supervision and strict handling if detecting “storks” blatantly operating in the hospital.
“The Department of Health recommends the Ho Chi Minh City Police to direct the local police force to strengthen support for hospitals and take drastic measures against the evils of “storks” in hospitals’, the leader of the Department of Health suggestion.
According to the Department of Health, in the long run, the health sector in Ho Chi Minh City still persists in performing the tasks assigned by the city’s leaders and the Ministry of Health. That is to support capacity building for frontline hospitals, including district and district hospitals in the city and provincial and municipal hospitals in the southern region.
In addition, the health sector continues to advise the city’s leaders to prioritize investment in infrastructure to meet the needs of people’s medical examination and treatment, especially to increase the mobilization of private resources to participate in opening more hospitals. new medical examination and treatment facilities, in which the public-private partnership mechanism is studied with the model of “hospital chain” and “clinic chain” of specialized and general hospitals at the lower levels, which are always overloaded and are where “storks” always take advantage to operate.