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DOH to evaluate traditional Chinese medical institutions

The Department of Health plans to begin evaluating medical departments and hospitals that practice traditional Chinese medicine next month.

Chu Wen-chieh (褚文杰), chief of the department's Division of Chinese Medicine and Pharmacy, said yesterday that the committee planned to complete the evaluation process by the end of this year.

He added that departments or hospitals that passed the evaluation would be given priority when it came to placing university graduates in internships.

Traditional Chinese clinics would not be evaluated, Chu said.

According to Chu, the emphasis of the evaluation would be on patients' safety and rights, as well as medical ethics and treatment quality.

Hospital management strategies and treatment systems would also be evaluated, Chiu said.

Chu said that only two universities offered traditional Chinese medicine programs and there were about 270 graduates annually.

In addition to serving as a guide for the placement of interns, the evaluations would also be used as reference for the Bureau of National Health Insurance when deciding whether to cover outpatient services in traditional Chinese medical institutions, according to the committee's news release.

There are 25 hospitals that specialize in traditional Chinese medicine and 72 hospitals that have departments of traditional Chinese medicine, according to the department.

Chu said the committee believed the new evaluation system would help to improve the quality of traditional Chinese medical treatments.
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