"Accept All Emergency Patients"... Government and Ruling Party Prepare Measures Against Ambulance Circling

Checking Available Beds from Emergency Patient Hospital Departure Stage
Enhancing Comprehensive Situation Board and Considering Additional Allowance for Off-Duty Surgeons Performing Surgery
119 Ambulance Mild Cases to Be Directed Only to Local Emergency Medical Institutions or Lower

On the 31st, the ruling party and the government announced that they will establish a system that can prioritize checking the availability of empty hospital beds and surgeons from the stage when emergency patients depart for the hospital. They decided to mandate a method of assigning emergency patients by forcibly discharging mild patients if there are no available beds through regional emergency medical situation rooms.

Park Dae-chul, chairman of the People Power Party's Policy Committee, Minister of Health and Welfare Cho Kyu-hong, and other People Power Party policy officials and government representatives held an emergency medical countermeasure consultation at the National Assembly on the same day. The meeting was held to explore issues in the emergency medical system, such as the so-called "ambulance roundabout," where a patient in their 70s lost their life after being transferred repeatedly between emergency rooms following a traffic accident.

Chairman Park introduced, "Regarding the one-stop transfer system, we decided to establish a system that allows checking the availability of empty beds and surgeons at the stage of patient transfer departure as a priority." He added, "We will install a control tower regional emergency medical situation room to command and monitor transfer status based on patient severity and available resources by hospital, and hospitals will be obligated to accept patients transferred through this system. In cases where there are no beds, it will be mandatory to secure beds by forcibly discharging mild patients."

Regarding this, he explained, "To improve the accuracy of the integrated situation board information, additional personnel for information management will be supported," and "the integrated situation boards have been installed at regional emergency medical centers and regional trauma centers."

As a measure to secure limited available resources such as the number of doctors, additional allowance payments will also be considered. Chairman Park explained, "We will consider supporting additional allowances through the emergency medical fund when off-duty surgeons perform surgeries," and "the ruling party and government agreed to prioritize providing special duty allowances to teams of four doctors at severe emergency medical centers to resolve the shortage of on-site doctors and surgeries."

Minister of Health and Welfare Cho Kyu-hong is speaking at the Emergency Medical Care Urgent Measures Party-Government Council held at the National Assembly on the 31st. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

For 119 ambulance teams, a plan to differentiate receiving facilities according to the patient's condition will also be reviewed. Chairman Park explained, "The principle for 119 ambulance teams is to transfer mild patients only to local emergency medical institutions or below, and regional emergency centers will classify severity before emergency room treatment, mandating that mild emergency patients are not admitted and are dispersed to lower-level emergency medical institutions."

Chairman Park explained regarding this measure, "The ruling party and government discussed three issues to supplement: the shortage of surgeons and intensive care unit beds, overcrowding of emergency rooms due to mild patients, and the information-sharing system between ambulance teams and medical institutions."

In addition, the ruling party and government promised to seek additional support measures, stating, "As emergency medical care is a representative essential medical field requiring focused investment, the ruling party will continue to support necessary measures such as revising the Emergency Medical Service Act and expanding the emergency medical fund budget."

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