JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Being the country with the largest population, China has only 2.21 licensed /assistant physicians per thousand people. Another serious problem is uneven geographical distribution of medical resources. Less than 3% of general hospitals are responsible for more than 40% of medical service. Both limited medical resources and distribution imbalance lead to countless of trans-provincial medical behaviors, resulting in an increase of economic cost and time cost. Meanwhile, China's mobile Internet communication is booming. A new type of digital medical care has been developed rapidly in China. According to different stages of medical interventions, operation modes of digital medical services can be divided into different types. Major functions encompass reservation, payment and medical consultancy. 3% of applications involve the management of chronic diseases. Many mobile medical platforms rely on doctors from comprehensive hospitals. Patients could be managed and followed-up via the platform. This Internet management mode of chronic diseases currently attracts 389,407 specialists from comprehensive hospitals and 895,921 patients with chronic diseases. Recently, the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC) has released “Management of Diagnosis and Treatment in the Internet (trial) (draft)” and “Opinions on Promoting the Development of Internet Medical Services”. It is worthy of attention whether China's Internet healthcare can dance with shackles under existing policies and achieve steady and rapid development in future.