Doctors' Day: Social significance of community health service centers in China

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August 19th is also Chinese Doctors Day -- a day set aside to recognize the contributions of physicians across China. Here we look at the endless hours of work they put down in the country's thousands of community health centers, dealing with the everyday complaints of people young and old, and from all walks of life. Daniel Plafker has more.

The Chinese government is currently in the process of reforming its health sector, as it looks to relieve the intense pressure on the country's large public hospitals.

One of the ways it's doing this is through a community health service initiative, where it's established special centers which only handle minor ailments and diseases and leave the larger institutions to deal with more serious conditions.

WangJing Community Health Service Center in northern Beijing is one of the more successful ones.

DU FENGDONG HEAD, WANGJING COMMUNITY HEALTHY SERVICE CENTER "I think community health centers have developed rapidly over the past ten years. The number of doctors in our health center went from 50 to about 200. Our number of consultations has gone from one-hundred thousand to about five-hundred thousand per year. Therefore I feel we are in a good situation."

Although the standards of community health service centers are improving, many still prefer the bigger hospitals.

However, Doctor Du says there really isn't a major difference between them.

DU FENGDONG HEAD, WANGJING COMMUNITY HEALTHY SERVICE CENTER "From an outpatient's perspective, there isn't much difference. The only difference is the big hospitals have a greater capacity to cure rare illnesses, and are better suited to those who require surgery."

One senior citizen we spoke to says she uses her local health center two or three times a month.

She says she doesn't only go when she's sick, but that just being there helps her feel good about her health and well-being.

PATIENT "Community health centers are more convenient for us. It's very inconvenient to go to the bigger hospitals. In addition, when we get minor illnesses, going to community health centers can help us prevent cross infection."

However, according to a research from "China Youth Daily", about two-thirds of its respondents say they do not trust community health service centers.

A doctor at the Wang Jing health center explained that people don't really understand their benefits yet.

DR. LIU WENTING WANGJING COMMUNITY HEALTHY SERVICE CENTER "Society is not giving enough exposure to community health centers. Because of that, most people are still choosing to go to big hospitals first, because they don't know about the functions of community health centers."

According to a research released by the State Statistical Bureau, there are over 35 thousand community health centers in 2016. Still, there is a huge potential market for community health center going forward. Daniel Plafker, CGTN.