Global Times

Shared medical mall emerges

Latest trend of sharing economy to improve national healthcare, but needs time to mature: experts

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The country’s first so-called medical mall, the latest edition to the red-hot sharing economy, recently opened in Hangzhou, capital of East China’s Zhejiang Province, Beijing-based Economic Informatio­n Daily (EID) reported on October 24.

The mall, situated in a building at a downtown commercial area, has attracted 13 medical institutio­ns which will share medical services offered by a third party – Quancheng Internatio­nal Medical Center. The services, provided by technologi­cal department­s run by Quancheng, will include such ones as basic check-ups, ultrasound­s and medical images. They will also include shared pharmacies and surgery rooms.

The opening of the mall comes at a time when a string of sharing economy models are blossoming in the medical sector. In Guangzhou, capital of South China’s Guangdong Province, the local government set up a platform in July to allow as many as 2,000 doctors to conduct multi-site, on-the-ground practices.

Experts said such a model could reduce the cost of setting up and operating medical practices through private capital, yet it faces challenges from matters such as the country’s closed-off medical insurance system and gaining trust from patients, according to the EID report.

A new thing

The Hangzhou medical mall is situated at a major commercial complex, of which six stories in the lower part are occupied by retail shops and the upper 16 stories are occupied by medical institutio­ns.

Out of the 13 institutio­ns that have already moved in, 10 have started operating on a trial basis. The occupants include a facial surgery parlor, a pediatric institutio­n and a traditiona­l Chinese medicine pharmacy.

Yu Xinle, an official at the Health and Family Planning Commission of Zhejiang Province, was quoted as saying by the EID that the purpose of having a shared medical mall is to better improve the utilizatio­n rate of medical resources.

“The affiliate medical institutio­ns that chose to move into the mall can be assets-light. Skilled and experience­d doctors with a reputation can even set up their practices with only one suitcase,” Yu said.

“The prospect of a scarcity of resources had daunted our ambition to set up an offline clinic at other sites in Hangzhou,” said Zhang Qiang, founder of Shanghai-based Dr. Smile Medical Group.

“After moving in, we found that many other reputable specialize­d hospitals are also here,” Zhang said. “This pool of medical resources translated into a certain appeal to patients, and the sitting together with a commercial complex helped narrow down our patient target group – those with certain incomes and requiremen­ts.”

Compared with traditiona­l hospitals across the country, those institutio­ns operating in the medical mall offer a better environmen­t and more privacy, and only receive clients via appointmen­ts, according to the EID report.

A pediatric clinic, for example, treats three to five children with prebooked appointmen­ts on a daily basis, with a registered fee of 350 yuan ($52.79). To put that into perspectiv­e, the same fee at a top-class hospital in Beijing can cost as low as 10 yuan.

Challenges remain

Li Qing, an industry analyst, said medical malls have been in existence in developed countries including the US, Singapore and Japan since the 1980s.

It is a patchwork of multiple medical institutio­ns that offer niche medical services with an emphasis on patient experience, thus putting pressure on traditiona­l big hospitals, said Li, noting that such an existence can actually improve the quality of services in the overall medical sector.

Yu pointed out that developmen­t in the medical industry and the climate for innovation in Zhejiang Province were the prerequisi­tes of the nation’s first medical mall.

Data from the Health and Family Planning Commission of Zhejiang Province shows that as of the end of 2016, there were 14,345 privatefun­ded medical institutio­ns across the province. A total of 693 private hospitals offered 62,766 beds, which accounted for 24.17 percent of the provincial total. And there were also 38,900 profession­al doctors working at these private-funded institutio­ns, or 23.11 percent of the province’s total.

In September, Tencent Doctorwork, an online and offline medical institutio­n invested by Internet giant Tencent Holdings, also announced its operation, adhering to its buzzword of the ‘‘sharing economy’’.

Thanks to the institutio­n, patients can complete a number of self-run medical check-ups.

Experts reinforced that health and safety is the bottom line of medical institutio­ns, which have the responsibi­lity of ensuring public good. As such, they warned that these institutio­ns should not prioritize generating profits.

Meanwhile, other industry insiders noted that nurturing trust among the general public is also a thorny subject for these independen­t medical institutio­ns.

Ground-level implementa­tion of multiple-site practice policies still needs improvemen­t, and the current closed-off nature of China’s social security system means that clients are not able to pay for many of the services offered at the mall via their social security accounts, experts pointed out, according to the EID report.

The current regulation­s governing the medical system, which are pretty much devised to govern the incumbents, still do not harmonize with the sharing economy model, the report said, citing some opinions.

Yu said the mall is still a nouveau business. While the bottom line is guarded, it should be run on a trial-and-error basis and discover its highlights in good time, noted Yu.

The opening of a medical mall in East China’s Zhejiang Province is reaping the benefits of the trendy sharing economy. Experts said the new form of medical institutio­n can help improve the overall quality of China’s healthcare services. However, it needs more time and better policies to properly take root.

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 ?? Photo: IC ?? An employee is standing behind the reception desk of Wellem, a pediatric clinic, at the shared medical mall in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province, on September 21, 2017.
Photo: IC An employee is standing behind the reception desk of Wellem, a pediatric clinic, at the shared medical mall in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province, on September 21, 2017.
 ?? Photo: IC ?? An employee of a dental clinic at the shared medical mall in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province, is checking files on September 21, 2017.
Photo: IC An employee of a dental clinic at the shared medical mall in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province, is checking files on September 21, 2017.

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