VietNamNet has received a lot of feedbacks of readers about super-fast medical examination at public hospitals in Hanoi and HCM City. Some readers tell us their true stories.

Super-fast medical examination: one minute per patient!

“What?”

“One minute examination is still long. I used to see a doctor at the Phu Tho City Hospital. He asked me how I felt. I told him the symptom. He wrote a prescription. This process took place for only 30 seconds. The doctor did not see or touch my painful part of body but he still knew my disease,” reader truongluong wrote.

Reader Tran Thi Hong Tuyen said she went for a medical examination at the HCM City Ear – Nose – Throat Hospital and the whole process was within less than one minute. “After asking two questions, the doctor immediately prescribed medicines. She even did not ask me about my health record, how I felt, how the disease happened…”

Many readers agreed with one minute is still long. “Not very long ago, I took my son to the HCM City Pediatrics Hospital 1 with a sprained leg. The doctor did not see my son’s leg, just said ‘Going for an X-ray now’. I was very worried so I brought my son to hospital but in such cases, it seems to be more dangerous,” a reader from HCM City said.

A reader whose child contracted allergy took the child to see dermatological doctors. The doctor only took a look at the child and told the mother and the child to wait. Later he gave the child a handful of medicines. “I paid the examination fees and said goodbye immediately to visit another clinic. That’s scarce!”

Another reader told VietNamNet that once she consulted doctors at a public hospital. The doctor only said one word “What?” and wrote prescription. She said she did not know she was examined in how many seconds.

Some readers, including doctors, said that it is not always good to have long medical consultation.

“An experienced doctor can define the disease in a minute. He can require tests to confirm his diagnosis. In such cases, quick examination should not be accused of rash examination,” a doctor from the Hanoi-based Central Pediatrics Hospital said.

However, the doctor cannot tell what percentage of doctors have that expertise.

Doctor Le Thi Kim Dung, from the Thai Ha Labor Health Centre in Hanoi, said that tests take a very important role in diagnosis.

“But tests are not everything. Doctor’s visual feeling is very important. Good doctors do not need tests to make accurate diagnosis. However, they must be experienced ones and take time to research patients’ health record,” Dung said.

Many people are sympathetic with doctors because doctors do not have enough time to carefully examine hundreds of patients a day.

However, some said that doctors are not interested in patients not because of overload at hospitals, because doctors still have time to make phone calls, to do their personal tasks, to meet with pharmaceutical representatives while they do not answer patients’ questions.

What solutions?

While doctors are overloaded, patients cannot accept inaccurate diagnosis. So what is the solution for this situation?

An official from the Ministry of Health said that the first measure is reducing overload at big hospitals. However, he said that it is difficult to implement because income of hospitals come from patients.

He said that only when overload is reduced and income for doctors increases, the quality of medical services will be improved. But how to achieve it?

Ngoc Anh