Mobile healthcare in China: all you need to know

by MICHAEL WOODHEAD
I've written a great deal about the bottlenecks in the Chinese healthcare system and the problems that stem from having a hospital-based initial consultation system as opposed to European-style general practitioner gatekeepers. While China is slowing moving towards community clinics (most notably in Shanghai) - it will be a while before there is any system that efficiently triages and treats the minor illnesses and also provides continuity for people with chronic disease. 
In the meantime, Chinese patients are struggling to access doctors hidden away in the fortresses that are State-Owned Enterprise hospitals. They face a lot of hassle to register for an appointment and then long waits to actually see a doctor in a rushed consultation. Nobody is happy with this situation.

Enter the Mobile Healthcare providers (Cellphone for the Yanks). The Big Three at the moment are Baidu, Chunyu (Spring Rain) and Tencent-DXY. Let's deal with them one at a time.

Baidu are making big moves into mobile healthcare. They are China's biggest internet search engine and major internet player, so they have a lot of clout. Baidu are playing to their strength and basically offering an online appointments service, based on their search engine results.
The recently launched Baidu Doctor app allows users to find the nearest available doctors and book an appointment. It also includes some menus that allow the user to work out which kind of doctor they need to see. There is also a rating system that allows users to leave feedback on the quality of their experience. Baidu are rolling this service out nationally, province by province, and have made some strategic partnerships with key hospitals to ensure that they are offering appointments with certified, named doctors. So far they have signed up 1000 doctors nationally - not many in a country that has 3 million - but they are working to ensure that the doctors they enrol are kosher.
As a search engine, Baidu have had a bad reputation for advertising dodgy healthcare services, hence the recent falling out with the Putian chain of private clinics - who some have said owe more to marketing than medicine. Baidu are now trying to build up a reputation for quality and reliability - as well as convenience, and they certainly have the resources to invest in building up a network of doctors. However, by offering what is essentially an online referral system they seem to me to be duplicating the role of the general practitioner gatekeeper. How Baidu will sit with the government's policy of building up primary care and discouraging people from heading straight to hospital remains to be seen.

The next big name in mobile health is Chunyu - Spring Rain. They are essentially an online consultation provider - with an app turning the mobile phone into a telehealth device to allow the patient to speak directly to a doctor.  
www.chunyuyisheng.com claim to have 45,000 doctors online, and say they can hook up a patient with a doctor for a phone consult in just three minutes. The doctor provides advice and medical information in conjunction with Chunyu's online searchable medical library. The service also offers an electronic health record, personalised advice and links to nearby medical providers and pharmacies.

This seemed to be a promising avenue until the health ministry outlawed online consultations earlier this year except for patients registered with authorised hospitals. I'm not sure how Chunyu are managing their way round this, but they now say that users must be registered to receive medical consultations. They have also announced that Chunyu will be setting up bricks and mortar clinics in addition to their 'virtual' ones.
I personally am not a great believer in online consults. They may be useful as a convenient substitute for a limited number of consultations where the interaction between doctor and patient can be verbal - but most illnesses need a healthcare provider to be there to assess the patient in person. It is often the subtle signs that are only visible in the flesh so to speak that are the most crucial. Not to mention things like continuity of care, need for tests and scans and physical examination. When online doctors can remove earwax, change dressings and do Pap smears I'll get the app. Until then, it's just a glorified advice line.

Last but not least in the Mobile Health wave of the future is the partnership between Tencent and the doctors' forum site DXY.com (Ding Xiang Yuan - which translates as Lilac Garden).
I have a lot of respect for DXY.com because their forums are docgor-driven and the site for good quality doctor-to-doctor discussions. They also provide Continuing Medical Education (CME) and healthcare news. There's nothing really like DXY in the west. There are the so-called 'Facebook for Doctor' sites such as Sermo and Doc2Doc but they haven't really taken off and become universal in the way DXY has in China. I should point out that DXY is focused on younger doctors, though it does have content sourced from the older 'master clincians'. The success of DXY really reflects the positive attitude towards technology and social media among young Chinese - but sadly I think it also reflects the 'silo' mentality of Chinese healthcare and culture, cut off from the outside world. DXY features a lot of content and discussion around translated medical research from the west - the big journals such as JAMA for example. However, Chinese doctors seem to feel more comfortable discussing medical practice and developments in their native language and behind the Great Wall of DXY rather than venturing out into the wider online world and conversing directly in English. The lack of access to social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook means that most young Chinese clinicians can't take part in the many vibrant medical exchanges now going on in the social media sphere - groups such as Free Open Access medical Education (FOAMed), for example.

Anyway, Tencent has recently partnered with DXY, presumably hoping to harness all that young medical know-how and try to extend the online physician-to-physician communication links to physician-to-patient links. At a recent medical tech meeting, Tencent's investment manager Mu Yifei explained their philosophy in mobile health. Rather than being a 'disrupter' he said Tencent recognised that doctors would still be a the centre of any new online health system, and the company aimed to provide a new, smoother pathway between patients and doctors, based on data and information. Ma said that it was early days in mobile healthcare development, but they hoped to harness the skills of doctor online using the tools that have already brought them so much success in areas such as microblogging (Weibo), instant messaging (QQ) and their taxi app Didi (just banned). It's worth remembering that Tencent is a $200 billion company so they're not short of resources to invest in the mobile medical market.
Ma said the main areas for reform in medicine are unreliable costs, information silos, inefficiency in getting to see a doctor and the lack of good networks  for users of the healthcare system. He gave an example of how mobile networks for restaurants now allow users to find a restaurant, peruse the menu, order online, make a reservation then pay and leave feedback. Can this apply to healthcare too?

At present the DXY partnership offers only limited advice online for patients. The founder of DXY, cancer immunologist Dr Li Tiantian, is sceptical of the 'flashy' medical advice apps that are now in fashion. He has said  the future lies in two-way communication between patient and doctor, not one-way 'advice' from the physician. His vision is for patients to be given more encouragement to self manage their illness and give feedback to the healthcare provider. In this, he sees the longer term role of DXY in collecting and using information from patients - rather like a market research company - instead of just pushing out information and services to patients.

This then, is my brief introduction to the mobile health players in China. It's a fast moving field, and like other areas of internet and social media in China, it is very much a local game, with western companies either excluded or late to the game. Having said that, China seems to be leading the way in mobile health - there is great enthusiasm for mobile solutions and the Chinese are avid early adopters. China also faces less of the red tape and regulatory barriers that exist in the west around matters such as patient privacy, confidentiality of data and the regulations around doctors' scope of practice when offering online consultations. The other big barrier to online health in the west is remuneration - doctors are highly paid and beholden to either medical insurers (the US) or national payers (NHS, Medicare) for their income. With huge pressure on their already mushrooming budgets healthcare payers are loathe to open up new channels in which doctors could claim income and further inflate costs.
In China, things are different. Doctors are poorly paid and at the mercy of their  State-Owned Enterprise hospital managers. The government is actively working to break these shackles and encouraging doctors to work independently in private practice. If China's doctors can see an income stream from mobile health, they may well jump in and meet the apparent huge demand for their services. The players in mobile health say that China's healthcare market will be worth trillions of yuan in 2020 - and much of that will be online.

Research fraud and inappropriate treatment: my blog about medical news from China for Sunday 15 February.

Last week I blogged about how so many medical journal articles in China are simply "vanity publications", written by ghostwriters to satisfy the doctor's need to achieve a quota of published articles. However, this week we see that there are also major problems with 'serious' research clinical trials carried out in China. An article in JAMA this week by Charles Seife reveals that the FDA found serious problems with the Chinese clinical trials of apixaban, a novel anticoagulant.
 At one site the FDA concluded that patient records had been altered. When they investigated further the FDA inspectors declared that data from 23 other Chinese clinical trial sites was suspect and should be excluded from their evaluation of apixaban (Eliquis). We often hear that western pharma companies are shifting their R&D from the US and Europe to China. It may be cheaper but with reports like this you have to wonder if it is worth it in the long run.

China is also trying to make a name for itself in high tech areas such as stem cell transplantation. An announcement in the Shanghai media said the city was to build the world's largest hospital for 'blood diseases'. This seems to be a reference to  hematopoietic stem cell transplant procedures for patients with blood diseases such as leukaemia. This is a highly specialised and expensive form of treatment for a small niche of patients (and often of limited benefit), so it is odd that a city that can't even meet demand in its emergency departments  is pushing ahead with a hospital for rare diseases. perhaps the explanation is that the project is being run by the China Stem Cell Group Co Ltd. This may be more about making profits than providing needed health facilities.

China's love of high tech for its own sake is  also manifest in the move by a Guangdong hospital to set up 1000 telehealth stations in pharmacies to provide online consults. The move by the Second People's Hospital of Guangdong to set up the Guangdong Online Hospital will reportedly include 200 doctors providing services via videolink. All sounds very modern, but how exactly does a doctor do a physical exam, order tests and imaging and provide 'hands on' care over a video link? It might be of limited value in follow up counselling consultations and for repeat prescriptions, but it sounds like a gimmick to me.

Online hospitals are supposed to help address the problem of overcrowded hospitals. I'm not sure how they will help the cancer patients who need a bed but can't get one. In places such as Changsha in Hunan the hospital bed shortages are so acute that patients have to make do with 'cancer hotels' instead. Patients with cancer who require treatment but who are on the waiting list pay 1100 yuan a month to stay in hotels adjacent to the cancer hospitals so they can go into outpatients for treatment. Locals say that about half the hotels near the hospital are occupied by patients, who face 1-2 month waits for a bed.

Breast cancer is an increasing concern in China, but rates are still not as high as in the west, perhaps due to dietary and lifestyle factors. Screening for breast cancer is also not part of the Chinese health system, although there has been some use of mammography. However ultrasound has been favoured by some Chinese clinicians, reportedly because it is more suitable to the smaller and more dense breast tissue of Chinese women. Now a study has confirmed that ultrasound is a more effective screening method for breast cancer in Chinese women. A study of more than 12,500 women who underwent either or both found that of the 30 cancers detected, five were in the mammography group and 11 in the ultrasound group, and 14  in the combined group. Ultrasound was more sensitive had the same specificity and positive predictive value as mammography. It was also considerably cheaper, costing $7876 to detect one cancer compared to $45 253 for mammography.

In other clinical news, metabolic syndrome (a highly dangerous combination of abnormal cholesterol, high blood pressure and pre-diabetes) was found to occur in 27% of Chinese people. A study of 15,477people in NE China found that 28% of men and 26% of women had metabolic syndrome. The condition was more common in Chinese on high incomes, those who ate more rice and those who did less physical activity - in other words, 'to get rich is glorious' but it also comes at a price of this disease of affluence. 

However, Chinese people might be forgiven for thinking twice about going for a jog, given the terrible air pollution in many cities. This has now been confirmed by Dr Liu Yu of the Key Laboratory of Exercise and Health Sciences at Shanghai University of Sport. This week he published an article in the BMJ which warned that the harms of ambient air pollution on the cardiovascular and respiratory systems might outweigh the benefits of exercise. He estimated that air pollution probably caused more than a thousand deaths a year in the city.

It's not all bad news from China, though. A paper published by the WHO this week shows that Chinese healthcare workers have had great success in reducing deaths from HIV using a simple 50c antibiotic, co-trimoxazole. Their study showed that giving the antibiotic at the same time as antiretroviral reduced HIV deaths by 37% - a staggering achievement. If routinely use in China for HIV patients  this could save thousands of lives among HIV positive people, the researchers sai.d Unfortunately, however, antibiotic use if often missed in this patient group.

Intern scheme concerns | Telehealth ban sparks backlash | Rural residents too poor to pay for care

Internship scheme will create bottlenecks and headaches
Doctor training moves to a three-year internship system next year but many medics believe the changes will leave hospitals with even worse staffing shortages. The new system which will see newly-graduated doctors rotate through various hospital departments to gain experience is intended to bring China into line with other countries and to create a uniform high standard of medical practitioners. However, critics warn that the additional three years of being a trainee will mean that doctors earn very little and the low income will deter many from entering the medical profession. Another drawback of the new system is that doctors will serve as interns in tertiary 'teaching hospitals' and will then refuse to be 'downgraded' to work in smaller local country and township hospitals.

Ban on telehealth consultations triggers backlash
There has been a major backlash against an announcement that doctors will be banned from conducting online consultations by the National Health and Family Planning Commissioning. The NHFPC said this week that 'remote' consultations are illegal except through accredited medical institutions because all doctor consultations need to be carried out according to the regulations of the NHFPC as currently laid down for hospitals and clinics. The NHFPC said remote consultations should be viewed as no different to any other kind of consultation and therefore all the usual regulations on medical practice apply. However, after a major backlash from health groups and online health providers such as www.haodf.com, the NHFPC said it would look again at the legislation and would 'listen to the opinion of the masses' in interpreting the legislation.

Rural health insurance not working
People who live in remote rural areas of China are so poor they cannot afford to seek medical attention when they are sick,  a study from Hebei has found. More than 50% of people living in the Dabie mountain areas of Hebei said they would not seek medical care if they felt unwell. The main reason (for 38% of people) was financial difficulty. Other reasons included inconvenience and preference to self medicate. Researcher Dr Fang Pengqian and colleagues from the Tongji Medical College, Wuhan said the findings suggested that the universal health coverage from the New Cooperative Medical Scheme (NCMS) was was not working for people in poorer highland areas. They said the locals could not afford to pay the necessary insurance premiums to  cover basic care and the low reimbursement meant they faced high out-of-pocket costs.

PLA leads the way on telemedicine in China

Medical experts of the General Hospital of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) held a joint consultation with the medical workers on the “Peace Ark” hospital ship of the PLA Navy, which is on the mission of treating typhoon victims in the Philippines, and offered diagnosis and treatment plans for victims via a telemedicine system on December 6, 2013.
The success of the joint consultation marks that the PLA has had the capability of holding ultra-long-distance medical consultations overseas and long-distance medical consultations during maritime mobile operations, an expert said. The PLA General Hospital is China’s first hospital to offer telemedicine service.

Telehealth trialled in Xinjiang regional hospitals

Liu Xiaohong, deputy director of the cardiovascular medicine department of Karamay Central Hospital, successfully worked with Wang Yan, an expert from Wuhan Tongji Hospital, through a teleconsultation platform to develop ideal treatment plans for two cardiovascular patients.
The two elderly patients have been diagnosed with coronary heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, respectively, and have been given proper treatment after a series of check-ups, including electrocardiograms and CT scans, and teleconsultation video conferences.
This is not the first time that Karamay Central Hospital has integrated telecommunication technology with diagnosis and treatment. It is cooperating with more than 20 famous hospitals from around China to deliver high-quality medical service and care.
Source: China Daily

Mobile telemedicine comes to China

Mobile phone imaging systems will allow doctors to do endoscopies remotely

by Jamie Thompson
JEMS Technology has begun supplying its JEMS mobile medical systems to the Chinese healthcare market. Initial orders have been placed for use of the JEMS systems in endoscopic procedures.
The JEMS server is being integrated into systems that will allow GI physicians to consult on endoscopic procedures remotely, an advantage in China where there is a limited amount of GI physicians and a large landscape.
Healthcare providers who use their smartphones to connect with colleagues and patients in China will benefit from the mobile solution, officials say.
The tool is slated for distribution in both urban and rural areas. Due to the number of healthcare facilities and medically underserved population in China, the company estimates the value of this business opportunity at $50 million.
“The Chinese healthcare market presents a tremendous opportunity; there is great demand for mobile medical solutions in China and the JEMS system is well-suited to serve the needs of healthcare providers in a number of clinical disciplines,” said Ron Perry, director of international business for JEMS.
Source: Healthcare IT News

Ministry of Health sets up national telemedicine training centre

The Ministry of Health has approved the establishment of a national telemedicine management training centre in the Sino-Japanese Friendship Hospital in Beijing.
Commissioned by the Ministry of Health, the centre will mainly carry out the following tasks:
1. Collecting and  analysing information about telemedicine at home and abroad to study the opinions and suggestions for the development of a telemedicine system;
2. Assist the Ministry of Health set up a national telemedicine QC network, to organise and carry out quality control work;
3. Organise the drafting of telemedicine management standards, to carry out the training of professionals in telemedicine. 　 　 I
The Ministry of Health has established a national telemedicine training centre to promote the integration of China's medical resources through modern information technology and to improve the capacity of primary health care services. The centre will also seek to resolve telemedicine technology standards that are currently not uniform, and to promote information sharing and interoperability between systems. It will also promote telemedicine demonstration sites and the establishment of standards and norms of the development of telemedicine and promotion through training, to promote sustainable development of telemedicine.

Read more: MD Tech