HCMC – The HCMC Department of Health has proposed the municipal government allow private hospitals and clinics to provide medical care services for Covid-19 patients at home as this would help ease the pressure currently faced by public hospitals and field hospitals in the city.
The proposal is also aimed at improving Covid treatment while the pandemic is still raging.
According to the municipal department, the city’s private healthcare system has 64 hospitals, 215 general clinics, over 6,220 specialist clinics and more than 9,000 drugstores.
Under the proposal, private healthcare providers can register to act as pop-up healthcare stations to deliver home treatment to Covid patients, while the public healthcare centers run by district authorities will monitor the operations of the private home healthcare providers and allocate up to 100 Covid patients to these clinics.
Each private healthcare station must have at least three medical workers, including at least one doctor and one nurse, and use the drugs allocated by the districts’ healthcare centers to treat Covid patients. Drugs for patients’ underlying illnesses and medical equipment will be prepared by private pop-up healthcare stations.
The State budget will cover all costs of home care and treatment, including the examination fee at VND27,500, travel fee at VND20,000 each and Covid testing service fee at VND16,700.
If Covid patients under home care and isolation want to select doctors at these private pop-up healthcare stations, they would have to pay these costs, which will not exceed VND200,000, according to the proposal.
As for private hospitals which want to provide Covid treatment services, the State budget will cover treatment costs, including examination fees, bed charges and technical service charges, while patients will pay the costs of on-demand services, such as room fees and meals.
