As of April 8, the fifth wave of the epidemic has been hitting Hong Kong for more than four months, causing more than 1.17 million confirmed cases and more than 8,000 patients to die. Hong Kong's medical system was once on the verge of collapse, public hospitals were overcrowded, private hospitals themselves were difficult to protect, it seems that everyone's life has once again been pressed the pause button, but for pregnant women, postoperative follow-up, chronic disease patients, cancer chemotherapy and other patients, their lives can not be suspended.
Now that the fifth wave of the epidemic seems to have peaked and shown a downward trend, what will happen to the medical process for these non-COVID-19 patients?
At the beginning of March 2022, Linlin felt a little discomfort in her throat, an itchy foreign body feeling, and wanted to cough from time to time, she thought of the high transmission rate in recent days, worried about whether she had been recruited, quickly used a rapid test agent for self-testing, tested three times are negative, her heart hanging in mid-air was put down, but then it was overwhelmed. The discomfort made her want to go to the hospital for consultation, and she hesitated.
During the COVID-19 outbreak, 13 private hospitals and more than 5,000 clinics in Hong Kong provided normal services, and most clinics had signs at their doors that read "COVID-19 patients will not be accepted". However, as a place where patients are dense and prone to transmission chains, whether to go or not is also the most tangled problem for non-new crown patients at present.
Lin Lin thought about it for a long time, and finally decided to go to a clinic near her home to prescribe some medicine, because some clinics currently require patients to show a negative nucleic acid certificate before entering, she did another nucleic acid before leaving the door, and came to a Chen Boxing clinic in Hong Kong Island West with the test results.
Chen Boxing Clinic on Queen's Road West, official picture of the clinic
The clinic is not large, but it is crowded, and the clinic nurse requires patients to show negative results before they can queue up for consultation.
When Linlin first arrived at the clinic, she came next to an old grandmother, when showing the nucleic acid results to the front desk, the front desk found that it was actually two bars (positive results), because the waiting room space is not large, it is a closed environment, the door is also closed, the whole scene suddenly fell into a panic, the nurse quickly asked the grandmother to leave the clinic, after the grandmother left, the nurse immediately opened the door of the waiting room, said ventilation, everyone do not be nervous.
"In fact, many elderly people now, the eyes are not very good, or can not read the instruction manual, he did his own self-test may not quite understand what it means." Lin Lin said helplessly.
After waiting for more than half an hour, it was Linlin's turn to accept the consultation, and the speed of the doctor's consultation was also very smooth, less than ten minutes to end, the diagnosis was inflamed tonsils, and the medicine was also very smooth, and the whole process cost 320 Hong Kong dollars.
"The whole process is still very smooth, the clinic nurse will be the patient according to the different symptoms of the triage waiting, in the most severe time of the epidemic is still methodically serving the public, before I will also worry about going to the clinic to increase the risk of infection, now I feel that as long as I do a good job of protective measures, wear a mask, try not to contact the equipment of the clinic, go home and disinfect myself immediately, in fact, the problem is not big."
Before March 12, patients infected with THE new crown and even with covid-19 symptoms may be rejected by private hospitals and private clinics, but after being criticized by Vice Premier Han Zheng of the State Council, many private hospitals began to actively participate in the anti-epidemic team, and most private hospitals such as Sanatorium and Hong Kong Chinese University Hospital have opened special outpatient clinics for new crown patients, and even divided special beds and wards for new crown patients.
In early March, Vice Premier Han Zheng accused Hong Kong private hospitals of refusing to accept COVID-19 patients, contrary to medical principles. Xinhua News Agency profile photo
So, will non-COVID-19 patients go to private hospitals to seek treatment?
The reporter learned that in order to alleviate the pressure caused by the treatment of new crown patients in public hospitals earlier, Stubb Road and Tsuen Wan Gang An Hospital supported by the Li Ka Shing Fund will provide a total of 100 beds to receive non-new crown patients from public hospitals.
Miss Gu, who is currently five months pregnant, needs to go to Tsuen Wan Gang An Hospital for regular obstetric examinations, and in early April she made an appointment in advance as usual for the date and time of the consultation, and then arrived at the nurse's station as promised, and the nurse at the nurse station carefully measured her temperature, and once she had a fever, she could not go to the doctor.
Tsuen Wan Gang An Hospital Ta Kung Pao photo
By April, the fifth wave of the pandemic seemed to have lost as much of the previous months, and the streets began to slowly rejuvenate. The number of people consulted at The Hong Kong An Hospital is small, and some temporary tents are set up in the open area at the front entrance to take oral and nasal swab samples for the patients, and if the patients have symptoms such as fever or upper respiratory tract infections, they will be arranged to see the negative pressure room or the tent outside the hospital.
The obstetrics department missed by Miss Gu was basically a patient who had already made an appointment in advance, so there was no need to wait too long. Depending on the cost of different inspection items, it is possible to have a small number of thousands to tens of thousands.
HK Ann Hospital requires seekers to sign a single form before each visit, mainly asking whether the seeker has left Hong Kong in the past three months, whether he has been to public hospitals, whether he has been diagnosed with COVID-19, whether his family or the building where he lives has been diagnosed, etc. Private hospitals need to report to the Department of Health on a regular basis.
Ms. Koo believes that although she will be worried that the outpatient services of HK An Hospital for patients with mild COVID-19 may cause certain potential dangers, she believes that the hospital will do a good job of coordinating triage and preventing infection, so that she and her baby can be examined with peace of mind.
Since 16 February, the Hong Kong Hospital Authority has opened seven designated clinics where mild COVID-19 patients can make an appointment by telephone to receive treatment at these designated clinics without having to occupy public hospital emergency room resources. As of April 1, the number of designated clinics specializing in medical services for mild patients increased to 23. In addition to the appointment telephone, there is also a "Care Appointment Hotline" where high-risk patients such as seniors aged 70 or above, children aged 5 or below, pregnant women aged 28 weeks or above, and patients with suppressed immunity can have limited access to appointment arrangements.
On 15 March, staff instructed members of the public to wait for a consultation at a designated clinic in Tai Po, Hong Kong. Xinhua News Agency photo
As for public hospitals, since the beginning of March, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, the largest public hospital in Hong Kong, has been transformed into a designated COVID-19 hospital, providing about 1,500 beds to receive seriously ill COVID-19 patients, and adding five new hospitals dedicated to treating COVID-19 patients.
Hong Kong's healthcare system is divided into two parts: public health care, funded by the government, is the cornerstone of Hong Kong's healthcare system and the universal health safety net, which mainly provides inpatient medical services and provides equal and affordable medical protection for Hong Kong people.
In early February, when the index of infection cases was rising, Hong Kong once had a large number of COVID-19 infected people flocking to the emergency rooms of public hospitals for treatment, resulting in overcrowded emergency rooms, requiring more than 10 hours of queuing to see a doctor, which also seriously affected the emergency treatment of non-COVID-19 patients.
At the beginning of February, Xiao Huang had a serious discomfort reaction after receiving the third dose of vaccine, high fever did not go away, full of weakness, due to Xiao Huang's limited budget, he could only choose the emergency services of public hospitals, he arrived at the emergency room of the North District Hospital in the New Territories at 8 o'clock the night before, from getting the number to calling the number, he waited in the emergency room for 8 hours, and it was not until 4 a.m. that it was his turn to consult. After the B ultrasound, take the medicine to the hospital observation, it is already 7 o'clock in the morning of the next day.
Although it is very hard, Xiao Huang believes that this is also a long-standing problem in the Hong Kong medical system, with 99% of patients entrusted to 1% of doctors, and the remaining 1% of patients being responsible for 99% of doctors.
At present, controlling the epidemic is the primary goal of society, but there are still a large number of non-COVID-19 patients who have the need to seek medical treatment and consultation, how to efficiently and reasonably divide the consultation area, and how to avoid the risk of cross-infection, which is also a challenge for Hong Kong medical care at present.
(Article/Reporter Liu Yanling)
This article is a new media article of Hong Kong's Economic Herald,
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