The nation’s urgent care center program to reduce crowding at big hospitals is to start trial operations next month, with up to 14 centers taking part, National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) Medical Affairs Department Director Liu Lin-i (劉林義) said yesterday.
The six special municipalities have applied to open 14 centers: three each in Taipei and New Taipei City, four in Taoyuan, two in Taichung, and one each in Tainan and Kaohsiung, Liu said.
The NHIA is in the process of inspecting the equipment and staffing levels of the applicants to gauge their readiness to take part in the trial, Liu said, adding that a decision would be announced at a later date.
Photo: Lin Hui-chin, Taipei Times
The urgent care center program is designed to relieve overcrowding in the emergency rooms of the nation’s major hospitals due to personnel shortages at smaller healthcare providers, especially during holidays, he said.
The centers, geared to care for people in need of urgent, but non-critical care, would be established in locations near large hospitals and charge fees at the same rate as district and regional emergency rooms, he said.
Medical appointment fees at the centers are tentatively set at NT$150 per visit, to be adjusted by county or special municipality health agencies, Liu said.
He also confirmed Minister of Health and Welfare Shih Chung-liang’s (石崇良) earlier statement that the planned urgent care centers in Taipei have completed their rosters for doctors and nurses, saying that city officials showed initiative in making preparations for the trial.
Regional hospitals are expected to run the bulk of the urgent care centers, with national-level medical centers picking up the slack, including one that has offered to open a center close to several hospitals with heavily congested emergency rooms in Taipei, he said.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare is to publish a map to make it easier for people to find urgent care centers near them and is mulling a proposal to establish a hotline, Liu said.
In addition, the ministry, in collaboration with the Taiwan Medical Association and Taiwan Association of Emergency Medicine, would create guidebooks to help people match their symptoms with the appropriate medical service at urgent care centers, he said.
The soon-to-be published guidebooks would include diagrams and sample dialogues to make them easier to understand, Liu said.
The centers will be open from 8am to midnight on Sundays for the duration of the pilot program, staffed by two teams of resident doctors working eight-hour shifts, he said.
Work at the centers would be limited to nurses and resident doctors to avoid competition with hospitals, as the former is obliged to offer overtime, Liu said, adding that personnel are also barred from working consecutive shifts.
Tentative rosters are being planned covering nine Sundays and one national holiday in the next two months, but no plans have been made for the spring vacation yet, he said.
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