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Taipei health chief formulates action plan

The new director of Taipei City's Bureau of Health, Chang Heng (張珩), yesterday said he would re-anchor the municipal hospital system and return a sense of responsibility to the city's hospitals.

"In the past few years the municipal hospitals have focused ferociously on their revenues. During the SARS crisis, however, we have seen that the medical system has become too focused on profit, easily forgetting about its social and medical responsibilities," Chang said.

Chang stated that he would rethink the entire operational mechanism, and then adjust the direction of the municipal hospitals. He would make a report to Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) soon and hope to put his plan into action shortly thereafter.

Chang also made a few points about the current anti-SARS work.

"There are two things I have learned from my surgical training. First, the patients should get the first priority. Second, teamwork is of utmost importance. If one or two people are not cooperating, then SARS may infiltrate the hospitals and make the medical team fail," he said.

"Besides the normal usual functions, a medical system should possess the ability to deal with emergency and disaster treatment. It is what we lack at the moment though," he said.

"But again, a crisis can always become a turning point. Facing the disaster help us to examine our medical system and make it better," he said.

Public education and the control of in-hospital infection were two focal points for dealing with the illness, Chang said.

Chang took over the post officially yesterday from acting director Ou Chin-der (歐晉德). The handover ceremony was hosted by Ma.

During the ceremony, Chang strongly expressed his desire to serve the country, to apply his knowledge and all his experience to help the country to survive the crisis at hand.

Several VIPs in the medical field, including Chang's former boss superintendent of Shin Kong Wu Ho-Su Memorial Hospital, Hong Chi-jen (洪啟仁), were present to witness the handover.

Several attendees, including Ma, endorsed Chang's competence for the job.

"Chang is an enthusiastic and energetic person. He's got loads of ideas and he's quick. With his experience, there is no doubt that he can be very good at his job," Ma said.

Ma also thanked Shin Kong Hospital for its willingness to lend the government a second deputy superintendent when needed.

Shin Kong has already released one of its two deputy superintendents, Dr. Huang Fang-yen (黃芳彥) for use by the bureau to participate fully in the anti-SARS task. Huang has been reassigned to a major SARS center at the Taipei Armed Forces Sungshan Hospital.

Hong responded that when the country needs Shin Kong, the hospital would surely give its full cooperation. He also commended Chang as a talented and competent professional. He said that Chang could handle the anti-SARS work with ease.

Meanwhile, Ou also lauded Chang's courage for taking up the hard work at such a difficult time in the city's history of health care.
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