Trịnh Hữu Tùng. – Photo khoahocdoisong.vn

Trịnh Hữu Tùng, Meritorious Doctor and Director General of the Hồ Chí Minh City Paediatric Hospital No. 2, speaks to Khoa học & Đời sống (Science & Life) newspaper on his hospital’s plan to offer a new health tourism model to young foreign tourists.

Will you please explain in detail the new health tourism model?

Health tourism is a broad term for travel that focuses on medical treatment in specialised institutions. It has become popular around the world, and Asia has become a venue for such visits because it has modern medical equipment, low-cost treatment and a good pool of medical staff.

Why does the Hồ Chí Minh City Pediatric Hospital No. 2, with a hundred years of history, want to offer the new health tourism model?

I should say that our hospital has many advantages to develop the health tourism model as it is located right in the centre of Hồ Chí Minh City, the fastest developing city in Việt Nam. We think we should share the city’s history and the hospital’s rich medical experience with the rest of the world.

By offering these combined services, what does your hospital expect to receive?

By joining the health tourism business, our hospital has responded to City Authorities’ socio-economic development policy while helping the Vietnamese pediatric care sector in general and the HCM City Paediatric Hospital No.2 in particular.

We want to offer our services to Vietnamese children and children from Laos and Cambodia, our two closest neighbours.

We also want to introduce the hospital’s historical development to foreign visitors from both near and far. Finally, we want to raise our revenue to improve the livelihood of hospital staff.

Do you think the hospital will do well in developing this new model?

Our hospital is already able to offer all the healthcare services our foreign peers can offer. Furthermore, we have a good contingent of medical doctors, including surgeons who have been trained in Việt Nam and abroad.

In the past few years, the hospital has been successful in quite a few liver and kidney transplants. Thanks to these achievements we have saved the lives of hundreds of young patients. Furthermore, our hospital is the only one in Southern Việt Nam that can provide cancer treatment to young patients.

Does the hospital have sufficient staff and infrastructure to offer services to foreign tourists?

Our logistics, infrastructure, doctors and technical staff are all ready to launch the new service. We plan to build a 10-storey high tech building in 2019, to be opened by 2021.

What are the values that your hospital will offer foreign patients?

We want to offer advanced medical technology at a low cost.

Our slogan is “the hospital is your home.” We will do our utmost to provide the best services to our young patients. This is the core value that we want to offer to our patients and their parents.

What is the driving force for the hospital to offer the health tourism service?

We have treated a number of young patients from Cambodia and Laos who came to us in critical condition. Some of these patients came from poor families. For us, saving lives is our duty and our goal – regardless of the patient’s social status.

According to the Vietnamese Ministry of Health, every year some 80,000 foreign patients come to Việt Nam for treatment, bringing about US$ 1 billion into the country. – VNS