JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Today, improving primary health care accessibility is crucial to narrowing the global healthcare coverage gap and maintaining health equity. Geographical accessibility, economic accessibility, and temporal accessibility are three essential dimensions used to measure health care accessibility. In recent years, China has explored several new approaches to improve primary healthcare accessibility. One such approach is the physical capsule clinic, an emerging institution, an upgraded version of the internet hospital. In coordination with the United Nations, the Yinzhou district of the city of Ningbo in Zhejiang, China has tried out this new model since 2020. The number of applications has reached 16 in Ningbo and Wenzhou, another city in Zhejiang, has started promoting the model this year. According to Yinzhou’s government health resource allocation plan, in the next three years, the number of capsule clinics in the city will exceed 190. The capsule clinic is more convenient than the internet hospital. It offers multiple services to improve primary health care accessibility—it offers telehealth and medical services, is uncrewed, and is open 24 hours a day, which can solve transportation problems and save time costs for users. Further, the whole process from diagnosis to prescription services can be completed at the capsule, which can save waiting time. Big data can be used to accurately identify regional populations’ primary health care service needs and improve efficiency in health resource allocation. With the help of the above functions, the geographical, economic, and temporal accessibility of primary health care services can be efficiently improved. Capsule clinics are planned to be widely applied in the future in China in places such as schools, nursing homes, remote mountainous islands, and the like. People will travel shorter distances and receive high-quality, low-cost primary care services with shorter waiting time. Installation of capsule clinics would improve primary health care accessibility and promote essential healthcare coverage.