Premier Li Keqiang stressed the introduction of competence-oriented evaluation reform to promote a clinic professional title appraisal system, during a State Council executive meeting on Sept 9, one day before International Teachers Day.

Measures to boost medical education development were deployed at the meeting, to provide a sound talent pool and safeguard people's health and fitness.

The number and system of medical talents still need to be improved to match the construction of the Healthy China Initiative, the Premier said, and the COVID-19 outbreak accentuated the urgency of beefing up medical education reform and innovation to guarantee sufficiency of talent.

Clinic practice to play major role

Despite the general phenomenon of qualified title appraisal essays, which acts as a basic threshold, the Premier added, the amount of medical staff's clinic practice wanes, as they are preoccupied with essays instead.

It was decided at the meeting that efforts should be made to improve the quality of medical talent and establish a supporting mechanism for clinic practice.

University-affiliated hospitals should step up supporting clinic education for students, and a training system for traditional Chinese medicine apprenticeship should be established.

According to those at the meeting, a standardized training system for resident doctors' clinic practice should be improved. And doctors with bachelor’s degrees who have completed the related resident doctors' clinic training will share an equal footing with masters of medicine in terms of employment and promotion.

Public health should eye national health

Premier Li urged innovation and development in medical education as well as cultivation of high-level talent on public health, and stressed efforts to deepen cooperation among medical schools, disease control and prevention centers, and infectious disease hospitals.

Public health should not be simply regarded as infectious disease prevention and control, but should be extended to national health, said Premier Li, adding that the promotion of national health should begin with disease prevention and physical exercise.

The Premier added that in some developed countries, the health industry has contributed the largest part to their national economies, while currently in China, the health industry has great potential as China enters the ranks of middle-income countries and people’s demands keep rising.

The country should fully develop the industry with great potential, he urged.

Decisions were also made at the meeting to optimize the structure of medical talent training.

The training of general practitioners should be sped up. Medical schools should provide general medical education for all students and expand free training of students set to serve at grass-roots levels, and central budget should support township hospitals in Central and west China to train undergraduate medical students.

In addition, the enrollment of postgraduates in anesthesia, infection, critical care medicine and pediatrics should be increased, and the proportion of classic courses in traditional Chinese medicine teaching should be raised.

Nursing personnel’s training stressed

The Premier urged strengthening the weak links in medical personnel training in order to accelerate the innovative development of medical education.

"A salient weak point is the shortage of nursing staff. When I visited Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital earlier this year, some doctors told me that more nurses were urgently needed during the fight against the epidemic. So we immediately sent more medical staff, especially nurses, from all over the country to support Wuhan,” the Premier said.

"'To cure a patient, 30 percent of the effort lies in treatment and 70 percent in nursing.' This implies how important and painstaking nursing is in medical work. Because of the shortage of protective equipment during the early period of the epidemic outbreak, many nurses would work constantly in the intensive care unit, for about 10 hours once they entered with their protective suits on.”

The Premier urged enhancing nursing personnel’s training, developing high-level vocational nursing education, and increasing the power of nursing forces on the front lines.