Number of admitted hospital patients decrease

The number of in-patients in local hospitals fell by 13.0% year-on-year to 54,000, according to data from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).
With an increase in the number of in-patient beds and a decrease in total hospital stays of in-patients, the occupancy rate of in-patient beds dropped by 12.1% year-on-year to 66.2%.
Hospital out-patient attendances decreased by 150,000 (-7.9%) year-on-year to 1,742,000, mainly due to a fall of 82,000 consultations (-26.4%) in Internal Medicine and a decline of 65,000 (-46.7%) in Pediatrics/Neonatology.
Analyzed by medical department, Physiotherapy & Rehabilitation accounted for 13.3% (232,000) of out-patient attendances, followed by 13.2% (229,000) for Internal Medicine and 10.9% (191,000) for Chinese Medicine.
Emergency attendances declined 30.0% year-on-year to 342,000, with those on the Macau Peninsula (278,000) and in Taipa (64,000) falling by 27.3% and 39.8% respectively.
Meanwhile, about 18,000 cases of surgical operations were performed in 2020, down by 6.8% year-on-year; surgical operations in Ophthalmology (2,788 cases) fell by 30.2%.
Also, in 2020, a total of 1,909,000 nucleic acid tests for the novel coronavirus were conducted in hospitals and primary healthcare establishments.
The number of blood donations rose by 7.1% year-on-year to 16,541 in 2020, with 3,110 first-time blood donors.
According to administrative data provided by the Health Bureau, the number of doctors in Macau dropped by 1.1% year-on-year to 1,789 in 2020, while that of nurses rose by 3.1% to 2,568. There were 2.6 doctors and 3.8 nurses per 1,000 population.