Rescue workers, wearing protective gear, transport a COVID-19 patient from an ambulance at a hospital in Seoul on March 17, 2022. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, March 24 (Korea Bizwire) — The government has decided to reflect the hospital admission rate of COVID-19 patients in the assessment of medical institutions as a way to give incentives to those who actively accommodate virus patients.
The Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters said Wednesday it devised an incentive to encourage medical institutions to actively accommodate virus patients by reflecting the hospital admission rate of COVID-19 patients in the 2022 assessment of medical institutions.
It has been pointed out that some medical institutions are reluctant to treat virus patients, thereby causing a problem in rapid transport of emergency patients.
Also, other factors that have been pointed out as problems included the shortage of communication between public health centers and 119 rescue workers, and the longer stay of virus patients in emergency rooms in comparison to the limited number of quarantine beds at emergency rooms.
According to the government, virus patients stay in emergency rooms for 352 minutes on average, about 1.8 times longer than 195 minutes for non-COVID-19 patients.
The number of COVID-19 patients who visited regional emergency medical centers increased sharply from 163 on February 8 to 1,796 on March 13.
To encourage emergency rooms to better accommodate COVID-19 patients, the government introduced a new medical fee payment system for cohort quarantine, a dedicated area for treatment of patients suspected of having COVID-19, in January.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
