Public hospital explains budget, sets new personal data rules

In 2014 the public hospital spent MOP240 million in outsourcing services from Kiang Wu hospital, the Health Bureau (SSM) explained yesterday in a press conference.
According to SSM the amount is justifiable by the needs of the hospital to relieve pressure on the number of patients looking for several medical services, particularly emergencies, obstetric services and dialysis.
In 2013, the public hospital spent MOP230 million for similar services, with that figure increasing to MOP10 million the following year.
Kiang Wu is part of a list of private entities that receive subsidies from the public hospital. In 2013 funding reached a total of MOP350 million and in 2014 that sum grew to MOP420 million. Other beneficiaries include the Federation of Trade Unions’ Rehabilitation Centre and the Macau Red Cross.
“If every demand focuses on the hospital, our workers will have a lot of pressure. On the other hand, we also want to meet the international criteria to achieve the best quality for our patients. Therefore, we chose one of the institutions, which is Kiang Wu hospital, to become our partners to provide this service to the public. We will pay the hospital and this hospital will provide free services to the public”, said Kuok Cheong U, deputy director of the Health Bureau.
Questioned by the journalists present, Bureau management did not want to advance a figure for this year’s budget since the balance sheet is not yet closed.
However, from the figures announced yesterday is possible to see that the public hospital’s budget has been growing at a rate of about 13% each year for the last couple of years from MOP3.1 billion to MOP3.5 billion (2013 to 2014), and it should be expected to grow at a similar pace in the following years.
SSM also explained that from that total amount, about MOP1.4 and MOP1.5 billion respectively were expenditures regarding workers’ salaries and consumption of goods.
Additionally, during the same press briefing, SSM informed the media that it will set up two working groups to respond to problems like the recent scandal concerning the abandonment of hospital patients’ medical records in the street. Kuok Cheong U also added that the Bureau would take other measures to strengthen security and privacy in the processing of patients’ personal data that include, for instance, the reduction of paper files, replacing them with a digital system.
“We will follow the recommendations of the National Commission of Health of Australia and create a working group for crisis management and a supervising working group to monitor all situations and try to survey all risk possibilities,” he added.
Another of the changes announced has to do with new rules for scheduling appointments, in order to streamline the process so it can be done quickly and without mistakes, said the deputy director Cheang Seng Ip.
This measure comes in the wake of the long queues observed on Monday at the Fai Chi Kei Health Care Center, an incident which Dr Ip publicly apologized for, explaining that it was due to a mistake regarding information on scheduling dates. “I apologize for any inconvenience occurred on that day. In the future, we will adopt the procedure that whenever a patient finishes a medical consultation. We will immediately book a new date for the follow up in order to avoid recurrence of this mistake,” he said.