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In order to achieve the goal of integration, homogeneity, a net and a center of medical groups in Hainan province, Hainan province built an integrated management information platform of urban medical alliances and county medical communities based on projects such as the provincial three medical linkage information platform in February 2022. The overall architecture of the medical alliance and medical community platform was divided into system integration layer, data center layer, service layer and application layer. The service layer included four major systems: unified operation management platform, business center, performance evaluation management platform and comprehensive supervision subsystem, which was the core hub connecting the data center layer and application layer, and also was the unified operation and closed-loop management platform of the medical alliance and medical community. As of November 2022, the platform had covered 31 medical alliances or medical communities in 19 cities and counties of Hainan province, achieving information exchange, personnel interaction, resource sharing, business collaboration, and data integration among member units, narrowing the gap between urban and rural medical and health services, which had preliminarily achieved homogeneous management of the medical alliances and medical communities throughout the province, for a reference for the integrated management of medical alliances and medical communities within the regional scope of China.
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Objective:To explore the views of general practitioners (GPs) on developing special interests in the context of the county medical community.Methods:A survey was conducted using self-designed questionnaire from November and December 2019, among 49 general practice residents trained in the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University School of Medicine. Meanwhile, structured interviews were undertaken with 14 general practice residents.Results:Forty-nine valid questionnaires were collected with a response rate of 100.0%. All participants were from the county medical community units. The survey showed that 91.8% (45/49) of respondents were willing to develop special interests and 79.6% (39/45) chose one subject, and the top three subjects were endocrinology, gastroenterology and cardiology. The structured interviews demonstrated that most participants did not understand meaning of general practitioners with special interests (GPwSIs) clearly and were unable to distinguish GPwSIs from specialists; they were confused about the status, training mode, and assessment standards of GPwSIs. The interviews also showed that the demand for developing special interests for them was derived from the needs of patients for diagnosis and treatment, the target population of health care services, peer advice and personal interests.Conclusions:Most general practice residents are willing to develop special interests, and internal medicine is the first choice; however, their understanding of the GPwSIs is insufficient. The survey suggests that the position, training model, assessment and certification of GPwSI need to be further clarified.
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Objective:To build a performance appraisal index system for medical specialty alliances, as a reference for promoting the development of the alliances in a connotation-based, high quality and sustainable manner.Methods:An index system was initialized by means of policy literature review and brainstorming, which was followed by two rounds of expert consultations to finalize the index system. Each index in the system was weighted through the analytic hierarchy process.Results:A performance appraisal index system of specialist alliances so developed comprised the six level-1 indexes of organization and implementation, hierarchical healthcare, influence capacity, talent cultivation, clinical research and academic research, as well as 31 level-2 indexes. The average scoring of importance and operability of all the indexes was>3.50, while the weights of organization and implementation(0.205 3), talent cultivation(0.178 8)and clinical research indexes(0.165 1)were higher than the rest.Conclusions:The performance appraisal index system of specialty alliances proves highly reliable and scientific, serving a desirable vehicle for the leaders of the alliance to develop cross-regional development of medical specialties.
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Medical alliances constitute a vertical integration of regional medical resources, and an effective means to promote the tiered medical services. As one of the largest tertiary hospitals in Xinjiang, a hospital has gradually built a " 1+ 6+ N" medical alliance cooperative system fitting the geographical characteristics of Xinjiang since 2018. The system was based on the hospital, made county-level medical institutions as the hub, primary medical and health units as the focus, and telemedicine as the bridge. It turned a telemedicine service platform as the medium, integrating such service segments, as offline practices of experts like clinical teaching, ward rounds, surgical guidance and discipline construction, and as online practices like remote consultation, remote diagnosis, remote education, and remote new technology training among others. Then these segments were integrated into such cooperative models as the remote cooperative medical alliances, specialist-cooperative medical alliances, inter-department co-construction medical alliances, precision-based assistance medical alliances, urban medical group type of medical alliances, and " alliance-consortium" integrated development medical alliances. These practices enabled the expansion and primary support of high-quality medical resources. By June 2022, the hospital had established cooperation via medical alliances with 285 medical institutions at all levels. The implementation of this cooperation mechanism has effectively improved the medical service capacity, diagnosis and treatment capacity of difficult and critical diseases, diagnosis and treatment homogeneity and remote diagnosis capacity in the region, as well as the smooth and orderly progress of the tiered medical services and two-way referrals within a medical alliance.
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Objective:To understand the incentive effect and influencing factors of the current economic incentive policy for medical alliances in Longhua District of Shenzhen(the alliance for short) on doctors′ willingness to work at primary medical institutions(the primary for short) from the perspective of mental account, and to explore the economic incentive effect of different economic incentive distribution methods on doctors′ willingness to work at the primary.Methods:The questionnaire was designed based on mental account theory. Random sampling was made in November 2019 for a questionnaire survey among doctors in two district-level medical institutions of the alliance in Longhua District of Shenzhen. The purpose was to analyze their inclination to work at the primary and their selection preferences for economic incentive distribution methods under the current economic incentive policy. The data were analyzed by descriptive analysis, and the influencing factors of doctors′ willingness to work at the primary were analyzed by χ2 test and binary logistic regression. Results:A total of 254 valid questionnaires were collected with an effective recovery rate of 90.7%. Among the respondents, 189(74.4%) were willing to work at the primary, 168(66.1%) chose to receive the economic incentives specifically for working at the primary, and 148 people(58.3%) hoped to receive such economic incentives immediately. Education background, self-rated economic income level of doctors and different payment methods of economic incentive for working at the primary had significant effects on their willingness to work at the primary( P<0.05). Conclusions:The current economic incentive policy of the alliance can meet the demands for economic incentives in terms of doctors′ material accounts, and doctors′ overall inclination to work at the primary was strong. If the amount of economic incentives is constant, doctors preferred to receive the economic incentives specifically, mainly affected by income accounts and additional income accounts. In addition, education and self-assessment of economic income level were important factors affecting the willingness of doctors to work at the primary, which may be affected by mental accounts other than material accounts.
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Objective:To study the willingness of county-level hospital physicians within a county medical alliance(alliance)to participate in county-township human resource integration for medical institutions, for furthering the development of such integration.Methods:Based on a discrete selection experiment, a questionnaire was designed for the selection of the work attributes that affect the participation of county-level hospital physicians in such an integration. On-the-job physicians from four county-level hospitals in a prefecture level city were selected by multi-stage stratified random sampling method as the survey objects, and a field questionnaire survey was conducted from November to December 2021. The mixed logit model was used to analyze the preference of physicians in county-level hospitals for five types of work attributes(work unit, monthly income, seniority required for professional title promotion, training opportunities, serving as middle-level and above administrators), the relative importance of each work attribute, and marginal willingness to pay with regard to their participation in the integration.Results:A total of 172 valid questionnaires were collected. When county-level hospital physicians participate in county-township human resource integration for medical institutions, their statistically significant job attributes and level preferences included monthly income, working unit of county-level hospitals, 7 years for professional title promotion, and more training opportunities ( P<0.001). The relative importance of monthly income ranked the highest among the five categories of work attributes, up to 55.55%. Conclusions:When physicians in county-level hospitals participate in the integration of county-township human resources, the most important was their monthly income, and economic incentives could enhance their willingness to participate.
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Hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system is an important measure to rationally allocate medical resources and promote the homogenization of basic medical services. The medical alliance is an important service mode and service system of hierarchical diagnosis and treatment, whose role is to perfect the up-down linkage and meet the patient′s medical needs. Informatization construction is an important starting point to promote the services of the medical alliance. In order to solve the problem of connectivity, the medical alliance needs to establish a regional referral platform and realize the integrated service of all medical institutions. Renji Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, has built a blockchain based referral system for hierarchical diagnosis and treatment, incorporating the S2B2C mode concept, and using the traceability, tamper proof and distributed accounting features of blockchain technology, realized independent storage of data in hospitals, realized real-time information sharing and interconnection, and provided a feasible solution for medical alliance management.
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Promoting balanced distribution of medical resources and realizing high-quality sharing of basic medical services between urban and rural areas are an important part of common prosperity. Huzhou urban medical alliance was a new urban and rural of medical alliance mode based on level 4 vertical integration, which played an important role in the whole evolution process of the medical alliance. This medical alliance had not only broken through the " integration of counties" but also explored the " integration of cities" . It was a bridge connecting counties and cities, which was of great significance in narrowing the gap between urban and rural medical health services. The construction of urban medical alliance took digital transformation and systematic integration as two breakthroughs to comprehensively promote the upgrade of energy efficiency and benefit stacking of health governance. In 2021, the grass-roots medical utilization rate and county-level medical utilization rate were 72.7% and 90.6%. In 2020, the average hospitalization cost(8 726.7 yuan)and the average outpatient and emergency expenses(239.6 yuan)of public hospitals were 25.0% and 8.6% lower than the average level of Zhejiang Province, respectively. Although Huzhou city had broken through the restrictions of administrative divisions and actively promoted the construction of the medical alliance, and achieved phased results, there were still structural defects and institutional difficulties. In order to solve these problems, the author proposed to promote the improvement of governance structure and optimization of governance system through " three governance" and " three characteristics" , and then promote the high-quality development of urban medical alliances.
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Objective:To explore an effective mode of medical preventive integration, so as to further the construction of county scale health-centered medical alliances.Methods:This study took five medical alliances from a county in Hangzhou as an example, and carried out the semi-structured interview method and typical case analysis to summarize the medical preventive integration operation mode in January 2020; the self-developed questionnaire was used to understand the operation effectiveness evaluation on county medical alliances by medical staffs and residents from fowr aspects: medical preventive team, medical preventive resources, medical preventive services and medical preventive information fusion.Results:Each county scale medical alliance promoted the integration of medical preventive by innovating the organizational structure, strengthening organizational guarantees, and integrating teams, resources, services, and information on medical preventive. The questionnaire survey showed that medical staff had highest satisfaction with the medical preventive service integration (3.75 points), and lowest satisfaction with the medical preventive information integration (3.69 points); residents had highest satisfaction with health information functions in medical preventive information fusion (4.20 points), and lowest satisfaction with preventive health care services in medical preventive services fusion (4.15 points).Conclusions:The evaluation measures related to medical preventive integration services need to be improved, and the quality of services needs to be promoted, all the information systems need to be interconnected, and big data on the information platform needs to be mined and utilized.
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Objective:To explore the integration path of medical resources in regional medical consortium, find out the problems affecting the process of integration, and put forward relevant suggestions.Methods:Methods According to the purposive sampling and combined with grounded theoretical research methods, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 73 government officials, heads and backbones of medical institutions in different regions of a city from August to November 2019. The data obtained from semi-structured interviews were analyzed by using grounded theory, and the path framework of medical resource integration in regional medical consortium was constructed through open coding, spindle coding and selective coding.Results:Four key links of medical resource integration in the regional medical alliance were sorted out, namely, integration prerequisites, integration strategies, support conditions, and integration methods, which together constituted the main axis of the theoretical framework. In addition, integration methods were affected by integration prerequisites, integration strategies and support conditions. The four factors and integration willingness served as influencing factors to exert impact on the integration tendency.Conclusions:The integration of medical resources in the medical alliance is a systematic project, which emphasizes the organic and overall governance of each key link, and the interaction between various elements will affect the final effect of medical resource integration.
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Peking Union Medical College Hospital, as one of the most stressful medical institutions in China, is facing the problem of emergency department overcrowding. In order to effectively alleviate the emergency overcrowding, improve the medical quality and patients′ medical experience, the hospital firmly grasped the two incremental links of " throughput" and " output" factors, established a multidisciplinary and multi-department cooperation team, constructed a close medical alliance cooperation mode, and innovated and explored a harmonious emergency overcrowding relief mode with the goal of unblocking the " exit" of patients. The practice showed that the comprehensive measures could effectively alleviate the problem of emergency overcrowding, and improve the medical environment and medical quality.
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Construction of medical alliances could help structural adjustment of medical resources, promote the shift of medical and health investment to primary level, improve the overall effectiveness of the medical service system, and better meet the health needs of the people. Guangzhou has established a multi-form and multi-level medical alliance system in accordance with local conditions. According to the distribution characteristics of medical resources in the districts under the jurisdiction of Guangzhou, these districts were divided into areas of controlled development, those of stable development and those of encouraged development. Different strategies were taken for various medical alliances. Advantages of traditional Chinese medicine were given full play in community health management and elderly care services, alliance of traditional Chinese medicine specialists was established to provide residents with continuous medical and health services. An appropriate medical insurance payment system was established to promote the implementation of the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system. However, there were still such problems as unbalanced distribution of medical resources, insufficient leverage role played by medical insurances, and rooms of improvement in the ability of primary medical services.
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By means of analysis of related national policies on medical alliances, and investigation of their current development in China, the authors summarized the conceptual category of existing medical alliances. Typical cases were selected for comparative analysis in terms of urban medical groups, medical communities, specialized alliances and telemedicine collaboration networks. In view of such setbacks found as lack of health services, ambiguity of power and duties of stakeholders, and low penetration rate of composite medical insurance payment, as well as lack of effective incentives and poor online diagnosis and treatment mechanism, the authors recommended on development of medical alliances in respect of framework improvement and mechanism optimization among others.
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Objective:To evaluate the operation effect of remote imaging network platform in a regional medical center.Methods:The workload data of remote imaging network in a regional medical center from 2017 to 2019 were analyzed.Results:137 medical institutions were connected to the remote imaging diagnosis network platform, and the number of imaging examinations in grass-roots medical institutions increased significantly. Part of the imaging examination in the superior medical center was gradually diverted to the subordinate medical institutions. However, limited by the ability of image diagnosis, grass-roots medical institutions relied on remote diagnosis of higher-level hospitals.Conclusions:Remote image diagnosis network is an important platform support for Internet plus medical health service, which can rapidly and effectively enhance the ability and level of imaging diagnosis in primary medical institutions.
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The construction of hospital administration talent echelon has become a " bottleneck" problem in the core competence construction of county-level public hospitals in ethnic regions. West China-Mabian Medical Alliance has made a preliminary exploration on the cultivation of hospital management talents in county-level public hospitals. The hospital carried out the working principle of " setting up a talent pool by post" , and gradually established a reserve talent pool with suitable scale and dynamic adjustment by providing part-time project management positions for young employees in the hospital. There were three kinds of part-time project management positions: part-time assistant to president, part-time project supervisor and part-time department management assistant. In addition, the hospital strengthened the ideological and political education, medical management theory training and practical training of the reserve talents in a planned way. The practical experience of hospital reserve management personnel training based on West China-Mabian Medical Alliance can be used for reference by other county-level hospitals.
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Collaborative development among medical practice, education and research is a strategic decision of the country in disciplinary development guided by the innovation-driven strategy. In October 2017, Beijing Hospitals Authority organized 18 tertiary hospitals with pediatrics discipline and founded a collaborative development center for pediatrics. This center operated in a model featuring both leadership of due authorities and autonomous administration. Two of the specialized pediatrics hospitals work as leading units, and existing high quality pediatrics resources of the member hospitals were pooled to establish an academics committee and an executive committee. A development system was established with disciplinary construction as the focus, collaborative development as the goal and horizontal collaboration as the means. It was designed to explore a new model featuring overall planning and standardized management of the discipline, building of a shared platform for clinical capacity development, joint development of continued medical education and talent cultivation, as well as diversified and multi-centered research and platform resources sharing. This model can effectively promote the overall development level of pediatrics in Beijing municipal hospitals.
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Guangdong province is experimenting with a model composed of various types of medical alliances, having achieved initial success with some of them and preliminarily has formed a holistic governance pattern. Experiences behind such initial success lied in a coordinated top-level design, reasonable and classified guidance, leader role of key governance subjects, and the construction of a telemedical system. However, as analyzed from the angle of collaborative governance, existing medical alliances have not yet formed a community of services, that of responsibility, that of interests, and that of services. In this consideration, the authors recommended to strengthen the collaborative governance of such alliances by respective governance subjects based on the theories of integrated medical service system and collaborative governance, eventually forming an integrated medical and health service system.
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Objective:To analyze the grid management strategy of medical alliances in Rizhao city, Shandong province, and to provide references for improvement of this policy.Methods:In August 2020, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 31 managers of three medical alliances in Rizhao city, regarding the objectives, specific measures, problems and influencing factors of the grid layout of the medical alliances. The grounded theory was used to sort out the interview data, along with the Mazmanian-Sabatier model for further analysis.Results:The analysis resulted in 8 main categories and 19 sub-categories, including theoretical and technical support, target group characteristics, policy causality theory, current status of policy directives, inter-agency relations, socioeconomic conditions and technology, public attitudes, and media campaigns. On this basis, a theoretical framework for the implementation of the grid layout of medical alliance was formed based on the Mazmanian-Sabatier model.Conclusions:The socio-economic conditions and technologies for implementing the grid-based management of medical alliances in Rizhao city were relatively mature, enjoying strong public support and good social response. But on the other hand, there were still such problems as unclear policies, imperfect mechanisms for synergy of interests among different subjects, and incomplete supporting policies. In the future, it is expected to form a policy implementation synergy, introduce supporting policies and strengthen primary teams building, in order to ensure the orderly promotion and long-term implementation of the policy.
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Based on the requirements of the standardized training for the community nurses, this study constructs an informatization platform on the overall design, and improves the content modules of the platform. The standardized training mode of community nurses has been constructed through team building and division of labors. After application of the platform, the participation rate, assessment of theoretical knowledge and operational skills and professional identity of standardized training for community nurses have been improved. The standardized training platform for community nurses has optimized the teaching resources and improved the teaching effect, worthy of application and promotion.
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Luohu District of Shenzhen has implemented the global budget management mode as " surplus reward, no compensation for overspending and reasonable sharing" in the hospital group, which continued to strengthen cooperation, optimize services, reduce costs, and improve health outcomes. The authors employed the game theory to build a game model of medical alliance under Luohu global budget management mode, discussing the reasons of medical and health institution′s stronger cooperation and what could be improved in Luohu′s case. Based on the experience of Luohu total budget management, it is suggested that when implementing total budget, all localities should improve closed-loop management, expand coverage, adopt compound medical insurance payment method, promote outpatient coordination, strengthen assessment and incentives, so as to give full play to the incentive role of total budget.