On September 10, Deputy Director of the Department of Medical Examination and Treatment Management (Ministry of Health) Nguyen Trong Khoa signed a document requesting E Hospital to urgently verify press information reflecting that patients undergoing cancer treatment in the radiation therapy department of the hospital had to put money in their books to be resolved quickly.
The truth, right or wrong, must wait for functional agencies to verify, conclude, and report. Before having an official conclusion, it is not possible to confirm whether the reflection is right or wrong, we should not rush to attribute responsibility to any individual in this case.
However, it must also be frankly admitted that the fact that patients have to pay extra money outside of hospital fees to be served faster and more conveniently has happened in some hospitals.
So the problem is that the health sector needs to build a standard process so that "bribe money" does not have the opportunity to affect the order and quality of patient service.
In hospitals, patients are always in a weak position, especially cancer patients, people with dangerous diseases or needing urgent intervention. They not only suffer pain and psychological pressure but also have to race against time.
When they do not know when the dossier will be resolved, how long to wait and who will be responsible, patients may develop the psychology of spending an extra amount of money to speed things up.
In reality, in the past, there were cases of medical staff suggesting and extorting. There were also patients who actively gave because they wanted to be cared for more.
But no matter from which side it comes from, once money can affect the medical examination and treatment process, fairness between patients will be broken.
In this case, people with conditions can be resolved first, and the poor must continue to wait.
More dangerously, giving and receiving money, if repeated without being detected and handled, will gradually become an "underground law", harming patients and dedicated medical staff who maintain professional ethics.
To no longer have the scene of envelopes squeezing into the treatment process, it is not possible to just call on patients not to give, medical staff not to accept or organize commitment signing.
The important thing is to build a transparent process, so that no individual can arbitrarily decide who is treated first and who has to wait long.
Hospitals need to publicize the order of reception, expected waiting time, test schedule, surgery, radiation therapy and the person responsible at each stage.
Priority cases due to the condition of the disease must have specialized indications and be recorded on the system for testing.
Each hospital also needs to have a hotline, QR code or security feedback channel for patients to report immediately when they are suggested by medical staff to give money.
Feedback must be processed within a specific time limit and information providers must be protected, without worrying about being made difficult in subsequent treatments.
The envelope can only be expelled from the hospital when the patient believes that not giving money is still treated fairly, and medical staff understand that any act of impacting against procedures can be detected and strictly handled.
