Page 152 - Hospital Authority Convention 2018

Symposiums
HOSPITAL AUTHORITY CONVENTION 2018

S10.1 Primary Care in Hong Kong 14:30 Convention Hall A

Vision and Future Development of Primary Care in Hong Kong
Lam C
Department of Family Medicine and Primary Care, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
This year is the 40th anniversary of the Alma-Ata Declaration on Primary Health Care by WHO-UNICEF at the International
Conference on Primary Health Care (PHC) in 1978 and the 10th anniversary of the WHO 2008 World Health Report “Primary
Health Care – Now More than Ever. The Alma-Ata Declaration set the vision of health for all and identified PHC as the key
to achieve this goal. The WHO 2008 World Health Report stressed the need of quality PHC that is equitable and responsive.
Primary care in Hong Kong has come a long way since 1978 especially in the past decade since the WHO 2008 World Health
Report coupled with the Hong Kong Healthcare Reform. Local research over the years has demonstrated primary care co-
ordinated by the family doctor achieved the best outcomes in promoting a healthy lifestyle, access to primary care, reduction
in accident and emergency attendance and hospitalisation, better patient enablement and more improvement in overall
health condition. We have proven that multidisciplinary primary care can save lives as well as money in the care of chronic
diseases. Quality primary care for all in Hong Kong should be our vision. To achieve this vision, we need to ensure everyone
has a family doctor, every family doctor is enabled, empowered and engaged in providing best primary care, and primary
care is adequately supported by the necessary multidisciplinary services and resources.

The Hospital Authority plays a key role in assuring quality primary care for all through the provision of sufficient family
medicine training posts, inclusion of the personal family doctor in the care plan, leadership in service innovation,
benchmarking performance indicators and being the safety net.

S10.2 Primary Care in Hong Kong 14:30 Convention Hall A

What Has Hospital Authority Achieved in Primary Care?
Chao DVK
Family Medicine and Primary Health Care Department, United Christian Hospital and Tseung Kwan O Hospital, Hong Kong

It has been two decades since the Hospital Authority (HA) embarked upon structured Family Medicine (FM) vocational
Tuesday, 8 May 2018 HA recruited a core team of Family Medicine specialists who were also accredited FM clinical supervisors. Planning of HA’s
training and developed primary healthcare services in the public sector in Hong Kong. Primary care services development
within HA aimed at achieving seamless healthcare between hospital services and those in the community.

Family Medicine training and related services were required following the formation of Central Coordinating Committee (Family
Medicine). In addition to setting up FM and Primary Health Care Departments in all clusters, regular engagement of internal
and external stakeholders including cluster and hospital management, as well as various specialty colleges, was crucial to
the successful establishment of the FM training programme in HA.

Space, manpower and training capacity issues were major aspects in ensuring training and service developments on track. In
the meantime, FM related primary healthcare services within HA were set up one by one, namely HA Staff Clinics and Family
Medicine Specialist Clinics (FMSCs) to commence with, followed by the management transfer of General Outpatient Clinics
(GOPCs) from Department of Health to HA, and development of new primary care programmes under the Government’s
Healthcare Reform Initiatives to enhance primary care. A basket of multidisciplinary services was launched successfully
targeting patients with chronic diseases, especially those with hypertension and diabetes. In addition, a new concept of
Community Health Centre was raised and supported by the Government, bringing together healthcare professionals from
a different background to provide multidisciplinary services and patient empowerment at community level. With population
growth and ageing related health issues, the demands for primary care and specialist services have been rising rapidly.
FM has played an important gatekeeping role in enhancing the accessibility of public primary healthcare services and in
relieving the burden of secondary care. GOPCs also have an important role in the public health arena, including government
vaccination programmes and designated clinics activation against infectious disease outbreaks during public health crisis.

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