<기사제목>Assemblyman Wi Seongon: "Jeju Island's Medical Environment is Poor, Proportion of Severe Patients Receiving Treatment Outside the Province Rapidly Increasing"

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters (Jeju) Reporter Park Chang-won] It has been revealed that the medical environment in the Jeju area is poor, causing a significant increase in the proportion of severe and emergency patients who cannot receive timely treatment and have to go outside the region for medical care.

On the 12th, Democratic Party lawmaker Wi Seong-gon (Seogwipo City) pointed out to Deputy Minister of Education Park Baek-beom during the National Assembly Budget and Accounts Special Committee's non-economic department inquiry, “While the ICU occupancy rate of 10 national university hospitals nationwide averages 80%, Jeju National University Hospital stands at 95.2%, the highest in the country,” adding, “The number of ICU beds in national university hospitals averages 7.2 beds per 100 beds, but Jeju National University Hospital has only 5.0 beds per 100 beds.”

Rep. Wi said, “In other regions, national university hospitals serve as advanced general hospitals, but Jeju is practically not in that situation,” and “The capacity to accommodate critical patients is low, increasing the mortality rate of severe patients.”

The overcrowding of emergency rooms is also at a serious level. Although the number of patients visiting ranks 6th among national university hospitals, the number of patients per emergency room bed is 1,331, the second highest nationwide.

Not only the beds for severe and emergency patients but also the general bed conditions in the Jeju area are very poor. The number of general beds per 1,000 people nationwide is 13.1, but in Jeju, it is only 7.3, which is just 56% of the national average.

To address the poor medical issues in Jeju, Jeju National University Hospital is promoting the expansion of the education and treatment building, a support project by the Ministry of Education for national university hospitals, including ICU expansion, emergency medical center expansion, and securing facilities for infectious disease crisis response.

However, even this faces difficulties in securing finances for project implementation because the current government subsidy standard for facility costs of national university hospitals is only 25% of the total project cost.

Although the government subsidy standard for national university hospitals previously allowed up to 75% support for small and medium-sized hospitals, it was revised last April to support only small and medium-sized independent dental hospitals, excluding financially poor national university hospitals such as Jeju National University Hospital and Kangwon National University Hospital.

Rep. Wi proposed, “The government subsidy standard for national university hospitals should be revised to include financially weak national universities in addition to the existing independent dental hospitals eligible for up to 75% project cost support.”

In response, Deputy Minister Park said, “I agree that the level of medical autonomy in the Jeju area needs to be improved,” and “The Ministry of Education will review this.”

He added, “Since national university hospitals focus on public healthcare, it is difficult for them to generate a surplus, so we will consult with relevant authorities about improving support standards.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.