At the invitation of the International Hospital Federation (IHF), Taiwan will play host to the 2006 International Hospital Federation Asian Pacific Regional Conference next week.
The IHF conference is said to be the biggest non-governmental global conference on medical and health-related affairs, next to that of the WHO. The conference will be held at the Taipei International Convention Center from Sunday to Wednesday.
So far 747 representatives from hospitals in 20 different countries have confirmed their attendance at the biennial event the Taiwan Hospital Association announced yesterday.
More than 1,000 local doctors or related medical personnel will also attend.
"It will be the second time we have organized this kind of international conference. The first time was 20 years ago," said Taiwan Hospital Association Chairman Wu Der-lang (
Wu said the association applied to host the conference four years ago but lost out to Hong Kong.
"This year, we did not file an application but the federation invited us to do so. It is truly an honor," Wu said.
Top-ranking hospital officials will attend next week's event to discuss problems faced by health systems in different countries. In addition, the contribution that Taiwan can make internationally to health issues will be discussed.
Forty-three domestic medical papers prepared by 23 local doctors and 53 medical papers from 30 foreign doctors will also be presented at the conference.
Wu said that Taiwan's cardiology development and research are internationally renowned and that young doctors from Canada, the US, the UK and Russia visited Taiwan every year to engage in research and study in this field.
"We shall take advantage of the conference to let more foreign friends know how well we can do and what we can contribute to internationally," Wu said.
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