CRI听力: Ministry of Health Responded to 8 Bottles of IV Drips

China's Ministry of Health recently responded to the excessive use of IV drips in China and says measures will be taken this year to tackle this problem. To find reasons for people's over-reliance on IV drips, our reporter Zhao Jianfu has more.



The Ministry of Health said in the first press conference of 2011 that to improve the situation, promotion of reforms of public hospitals and other medical reform measures are needed. The Ministry of Health will continue to strengthen the internal management of hospitals, supervise hospitals to conduct medical activities based on the clinical path of diseases, and enhance the work of controlling medical costs.

Statistics from the National Development and Reform Commission show 10.4 billion bottles of medicine were used intravenously in 2009, which means that every person in China received an average of eight bottles of IV drips. This number is much higher than the world average of 2.5 to 3.3 bottles.

International convention for medication gives priority to taking pills and injections before IV drips, and IV drips should not be used unless pills and injections fail to work. But the practice of skipping pills and jumping to IV drips right from the beginning, according to Doctor Li Hongjun from Beijing Union Medical College Hospital, is due to pressure from patients.

"Ordinary Chinese people's opinion is once ill, they can only recover after some IV drips. Often, patients ask for IV drips, so I think, the over-use of IV drips is because of Chinese people's concept of medical treatment, it is a problem of the public."

People want drugs therefore doctors prescribe drugs. This may seem like a reasonable explanation. However, it should not be the final answer. After all, who gave people the idea that the more drugs the better.

Dr. Richard Cyr from the International Medical Center in Beijing said apart from the fact that Chinese are used to IV drips and antibiotics and therefore expect IV drips when ill, there's financial reasons behind the over-use of drugs.

"I think in China, from what I understand, there's a little bit of a marketing issue as well, because there's the pressure from the local hospitals to get revenue from the medicines they sell, so there's this financial incentive to provide antibiotics to patients."

Dr. Cyr's assumption is confirmed by another doctor from Beijing DCN Orthopaedic Hospital who requested anonymity. He considers financial incentives as the number one reason for the overdose of drugs.

"Currently, over-treatment does exist in the medical system. There are all kinds of different reasons for this, but the first is the financial factor. No matter it's a public hospital or a private hospital, the financial target is one of their assessment targets."

Doctors' moral values is to be questioned. But this is still not the final answer. Moral hazard can only happen when there is information asymmetry. To eliminate this, the Ministry of Health said efforts will be made to make information of regional medical expenses and medical costs of treating single disease known to the public, so people can choose from different medical treatment options and supervise hospitals.

For CRI, I'm Zhao Jianfu.