Officials of the Ministry of Health on August 19 paid working visits to the Central Highlands province of Gia Lai and Ho Chi Minh City to look at the operation of local health care networks.

In Gia Lai, Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien spoke highly of efforts by local health sector in improving the quality of medical check-up and treatment.

She urged the sector to soon draw up a human resources development plan which focuses on training specialists, in order to solve the current shortage of doctors.

She suggested the building of satellite hospitals to take advantage of investment and technology transfer from central-level hospitals.

The minister also asked Gia Lai to work harder to further cut down mother and infant mortality rates by extending the vaccination campaign to remote areas.

Meanwhile, in Ho Chi Minh City , Cao Hung Thai, deputy head of the ministry’s Health Examination and Treatment Management Department, checked the improvement of health care services at the Trung Vuong Hospital and the Hospital of District 2.

He found that the time patients have to wait for their check-up has been shortened significantly thanks to increasing staff and information technology application.

Surveys of medical establishments across Vietnam show that health examination process has seen a reduction from 10-17 steps to 4-6 while patients now have to wait for only about 40 minutes on average to get a check-up.-VNA