The reporter learned at the 2024 National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine Directors' Conference, which opened in Beijing on the 22nd, that in 2023 the total number of visits to traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) medical and health institutions nationwide is expected to reach 1.28 billion, achieving steady growth, and that China's TCM service capacity has been further enhanced.

In order to enable more people to access quality TCM care, China has taken multiple measures to accelerate the expansion and downward extension of high-quality TCM medical resources and to promote balanced regional distribution.

Yu Yanhong, Party Secretary and Director of the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, introduced at the conference that by the end of 2023, China had included 14 TCM hospitals as founding units of national medical centers, planned and built 27 national regional medical centers in the TCM category, and continued to advance the construction of 62 integrated Chinese-Western medicine "flagship" hospitals and 138 key hospitals with TCM characteristics, making positive progress in building a high-quality and efficient TCM service system.

At the same time, in order to continuously strengthen primary-level TCM service capacity, the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine held a meeting to advance the construction of county-level TCM hospitals, supporting each of 440 county-level TCM hospitals in building two specialty disciplines with TCM advantages and one county-level center for promoting appropriate TCM technologies, so as to consolidate the primary-level network with the construction of county-level TCM hospitals as the leader.

As China's TCM service network becomes increasingly complete, it is becoming more and more convenient for people to seek TCM care. According to reports, at present, 89% of public general hospitals at the secondary level and above and 62.8% of maternity and child health hospitals in China have TCM clinical departments, and TCM clinics in 23 provinces have basically achieved full coverage.

In 2024, China will take the in-depth implementation of major projects for the revitalization and development of traditional Chinese medicine as the lever, and the strengthening of the construction of specialty disciplines with TCM advantages as the entry point, to accelerate the high-quality development of traditional Chinese medicine.

It is understood that in 2024 China plans to formulate management measures for the construction of national specialty disciplines with TCM advantages, select and build about 150 clinical collaboration projects integrating Chinese and Western medicine for major and difficult diseases, and implement an action to enhance the capacity for integrated Chinese-Western medicine development in general hospitals... A series of measures will continuously improve TCM service capacity and better meet the needs of the people.