WHDZ to boast 3 DRG pilot medical institutions

Three medical institutions in the Wuhan Economic and Technological Development Zone (WHDZ) have been added as diagnosis-related groups (DRG) pilot medical institutions, according to local media reports.

The three are among 74 pilot medical institutions in Wuhan, the capital city of Central China’s Hubei province.

The DRG pilot program is a patient classification system to standardize medical insurance payments.

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 details on each patient.

The pilot places, including Beijing, Shanghai and Wuhan, are scheduled to start the new payment mode in 2021 after a trial run in 2020.

According to Hu Jingchen, an official from the People's Hospital of Wuhan University, the implementation of DRG will prompt hospitals and doctors to change unreasonable medical behaviors such as using precious drugs, consumables and large-scale inspection equipment for patients.

In the second half of 2018, Wuhan city carried out the medical insurance DRG payment simulation calculation at three hospitals – Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan Hospital of Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine and the Central Hospital of Wuhan.

Through simulation calculations, compared with the current payment methods, the total medical insurance budget of the two hospitals decreased significantly, and one of the hospitals reduced medical insurance expenditure by 111 million yuan ($15.8 million).