Taiwan’s 14th urgent care center to open on Sunday
A HEALTHY HOLIDAY: About 75 percent of clinics were open yesterday and some hospitals resumed outpatient services, helping relieve ER overcrowding
By Lee I-chia / Staff reporter
The nation’s 14th urgent care center (UCC) is to open in Tainan on Sunday, while Taipei aims to open a new center at Huashan Market, Minister of Health and Welfare Shih Chung-liang (石崇良) said yesterday.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare in November last year launched a pilot program with 13 UCCs in the six special municipalities to provide emergency treatment for mild illness and injuries on weekends and on holidays to relieve pressure on crowded emergency rooms.
With schools and work suspended nearly nationwide due to Typhoon Champi on Friday, the long holiday weekend became a four-day weekend for many people.
A person is treated at an urgent care center in Taipei in an undated photograph.
Photo: Lin Chih-yi, Taipei Times
About 75 percent of clinics were open yesterday and some hospitals also resumed outpatient services, which helped relieve overcrowding at emergency departments, Shih said.
In addition, a new UCC would open at Tainan’s Da-an Women and Children Hospital on Sunday, he said.
As there was an average of more than 100 patients at the UCC at Tainan’s Yongchuan Hospital, the city’s public health bureau proposed opening another one, he said.
Before the Double Ten National Day three-day weekend, the ministry had announced that during long weekends through the end of this year, a 50-percent surcharge would be added to consultation fees, nursing fees and pharmacist service fees at primary care clinics and hospitals’ outpatient and emergency departments, Shih said.
Eighty percent of the surcharge must be distributed to on-duty staff, he said.
To alleviate overcrowding at National Taiwan University Hospital’s emergency department, the Taipei Department of Health is planning to set up a UCC near the hospital at the Huashan Market, Shih said.
Preparations for the center are under way, and the department hopes to open it before the Lunar New Year holiday next year, he said.
Between July and Oct. 18, the most common reasons for visiting the nation’s 13 UCCs were for fever and respiratory infections (46 percent), followed by minor wounds (13 percent) and gastrointestinal discomfort (9 percent), National Health Insurance Administration data showed.
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