Jeonnam Province Holds Policy Meeting to Address Medical Vacancy Due to Decrease in Public Health Doctors

On the 10th, Jeonnam Province announced that it held a policy meeting to devise measures to address the regional medical service gap due to the annual decline in the number of public health doctors.

At the meeting, nine public health doctor placement officials attended, including Choi Un-chang, President of the Jeonnam Medical Association; Jeong Ki-ho, Director of Gangjin Medical Center; Kim Dong-guk, Director of Haenam General Hospital; Jo Jin-seok, Representative of Jeonnam Province Public Health Doctors; and representatives of city and county health center directors. They assessed the current medical situation in the province and focused on discussing solutions to the future shortage of public health doctors.

The province expects that in 2023, the number of newly enlisted public health doctors will decrease by 34 in the medical department compared to those completing their service, while the dental and Korean medicine departments will increase by 5 and 6 respectively.

Over the past five years, the number of public health doctors assigned in Jeonnam has shown a declining trend: 645 in 2019, 638 in 2020, 637 in 2021, 609 in 2022, and 586 in 2023.

The main reasons for the decrease in public health doctors are identified as a combination of factors, including the annual increase in the proportion of female medical school entrants, the rising proportion of those who have completed military service, and the burden of a long service period of 36 months, which is twice the 18-month active duty period.

Accordingly, the meeting discussed institutional improvements such as the phased reduction of public health doctors' service periods, changes to the deployment standards for emergency medical and night shift personnel for island residents, and revisions to guidelines to allow on-call duty reflecting the realities of hospital operations in emergency-vulnerable areas.

Additionally, various opinions were presented, including the consolidation or closure of health clinics with low medical performance, converting health clinics without public health doctors into health promotion clinics to strengthen customized health promotion programs for residents alongside medical treatment, and utilizing retired doctors from outlying areas.

Lee Sang-sim, Director of the Health and Welfare Bureau of Jeonnam Province, stated, “After reviewing the various opinions presented, we will actively propose them to the Ministry of Health and Welfare for institutional improvements and promptly prepare Jeonnam Province’s own response measures to minimize medical service gaps within the region.”

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