Press Releases
SFH on obstetrics services, medical staff manpower and radiation detection
Following is the transcript of remarks (English portion) made by the
Secretary for Food and Health, Dr York Chow, at a media stand-up session
after attending a meeting of the Panel on Health Services of the Legislative
Council today (April 11):
Reporter: (on delivery services given to Mainland pregnant women whose
husbands are permanent residents)
Secretary for Food and Health: At the moment, there is a limitation on how
we can administer such a discretion. With the motion passed by the Panel on
Health Services of the Legislative Council, we have to study how it should
be done.
Reporter: (on the difficulties faced by the Hospital Authority)
Secretary for Food and Health: At present, frontline staff at the Hospital
Authority would identify a patient who is entitled to Hong Kong's medical
service subsidy according to his identity card. If there is anything that
requires further verification of certificates and so on, it will be a
difficult task for many of them. We have to seek various opinions, including
legal opinion, before we can actually decide whether that can be done or
not.
Reporter: (on manpower wastage of medical staff)
Secretary for Food and Health: The Hospital Authority has responded earlier
that they will, according to the services needed, review their manpower. In
general, Hong Kong needs a greater supply of medical doctors. Whether it
comes from a gradual increase of our medical school intake, or from some
overseas doctors, it will depend on the imminency of the situation. At the
moment, the Hospital Authority is trying every means to retain their staff,
and at the same time trying to retain some of the experienced staff even on
a part-time basis so that they can assist in the services.
Reporter: (on detection of Caesium-137 in air sample in Hong Kong)
Secretary for Food and Health: The level of Caesium has been detected is
extremely low and would not affect the health of any individual or human
beings in general. At the moment, we have to keep on monitoring the
situation, both from Hong Kong as well as our surrounding regions,
particularly also from the source in Japan, to see whether there is an
increasing risk or not. I think it is quite natural that after a few weeks
of radiation leak in the atmosphere, there would be some minute level of
radiation everywhere. But according to the experts, this is well, well below
the safety limit.
Reporter: (on discussion with private hospitals on obstetric and neonatal
services)
Secretary for Food and Health: We agreed with the private hospital
representatives a week ago that they would come up with a recommended number
of deliveries for each hospital according to their service capacity. I hope
that by the end of this month, we can have the first meeting to discuss the
principles of how that can be calculated. And then by the end of May,
hopefully we will come up with the full figures of individual hospitals and
also the capacity of the Hospital Authority for the next year.
Reporter: (on retaining medical staff)
Secretary for Food and Health: The Hospital Authority has tried every means
to retain staff, particularly medical staff. As you know the majority of
staff in the Hospital Authority are doctors and they have mainly undergone
special training which usually requires about six to nine years. At the
moment, the Hospital Authority can provide such an opportunity for them. But
the other thing we need to be concerned about is whether they are working
for extremely long hours that would affect their concentration and
competency. In different specialties, the Hospital Authority would define
certain limitations of "call hours", in other words the length of their
working hours. The total (working) hours for a certain week should also be
limited to a certain number. At the moment, they have already cut down the
number of doctors that work more than 65 hours per week from 18% to about
4.6%. The average working hours for doctors are roughly about 52 hours for
different specialties. But some specialties are much more hectic. When they
are working, they are working at full stretch. When some of them have longer
working hours, they might have some hours of rest in between. I think we
need to be flexible, and at the same time we need to respect that they have
to have some quality of life as well. So this is what the Hospital Authority
is doing. The other thing that they will look at is promotion and training
aspects. I think most doctors would like to have opportunity to enrich
themselves by training and be more experienced. These are also important
aspects for young doctors.
(Please also refer to the
Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Monday, April 11, 2011
Issued at HKT 14:42
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