Hospital payment mechanism tweaks to benefit patients

China is tweaking the existing payment mechanism adopted by hospitals to make it more beneficial for patients as part of its deepening medical reforms.

The National Healthcare Security Administration and three other departments jointly issued a circular in early June indicating that the nation will launch a pilot program of diagnosis-related groups, or DRGs, a patient classification to standardize medical insurance payment, in 30 cities.

Patients will be categorized into DRGs with similar clinical symptoms and resource costs according to their age, gender, length of stay and clinical diagnosis. Medical fees and insurance payments will thus be based on DRG classification instead of specific patients.