Capital faces pediatric crisis

Capital faces pediatric crisis

• Source: Global Times
• [09:22 March 07 2011]
• Comments

A family doses while waiting to see doctors at Beijing Children's Hospital in December 2010. Photo: CFP

Lack of government support to train pediatricians and financial support to pediatric hospitals are to blame for the strained medical resources in the capital city, said experts.

Doctors at the two major pediatric hospitals in Beijing, Capital Institute of Pediatrics and Beijing Children's Hospital, receive on average about 50 kids per staff member per day.

While on the same day, pediatricians at other general hospitals in the capital received only two to four patients, according to the Beijing Municipal Health Bureau.

"Pediatrics departments bring little profit to general hospitals, as the government has allocated almost no funding to pediatrics in recent years. This is why hospitals are unwilling to purchase expensive equipment for pediatric exams," said Liu Guiying, director of the pediatrics department of Beijing Anzhen Hospital.

Zhu Zonghan, chairman of the China Pediatricians Association, believes a lack of government support has contributed to the nationwide shortage of pediatricians.

China removed pediatrics as an undergraduate major from almost all medical colleges in 1999.

Since then, students who want to specialize in pediatrics have to be trained at pediatric hospitals for an extra three years upon graduation of a five-year comprehensive study in colleges of medical sciences, said Zhu.

He also blamed the insufficient government investment in pediatrics while complaining pediatric diseases were scarcely listed as major fields of research, adding that China has pumped so much into subway building but tightened up for progress of pediatrics.

"Pediatricians are severely needed, but the government strictly limits the quota of pediatrics staff in hospitals," said Liu. "Even though pediatricians are needed, there aren't enough vacancies for them, which in turn discourages medical students from choosing to become a pediatrician."