Effective use of primary health care funding for students

Proper use of the Health Insurance Fund

A new school year has come, in addition to "training morality and talent", each student is also accompanied and taken care of in school by participating in health insurance. As one of the units that has done well in primary health care for students in recent years, Vinh Tan Secondary School (Vinh City) always determines that primary health care for students in school is extremely necessary, to ensure the health of students and improve the quality of learning.

Ms. Pham Thi Phuong Lan - school health officer of Vinh Tan Secondary School (Vinh City) is building a school health plan to prepare for the new school year. Photo: Thanh Hien

Talking with Ms. Pham Thi Phuong Lan - school health officer of Vinh Tan Secondary School, we learned that: In the past time, the school has always used the primary health care fund for the right purpose and effectively. School health officers use this fund to purchase common medical equipment, medicines such as flu, stomachache, bandages of all kinds... to serve first aid and health care for students during their study time. The health check-up logbook is provided to the whole school. During the prolonged Covid-19 epidemic, the fund was mainly used to buy disinfectant spray, hand sanitizer, Covid-19 test strips, and automatic disinfectant machines for public places to serve students, teachers, etc.

According to regulations, the condition for educational institutions to be funded by the Health Insurance Fund for medical examination and treatment in primary health care is to have at least 01 person who is qualified to practice medical examination and treatment according to the provisions of the law on medical examination and treatment, working full-time or part-time in primary health care. If not, the school must sign a contract with a commune, ward, town health station or a medical examination and treatment facility from the form of a general clinic or higher to take care of the health of students. In addition, educational institutions must have a medical room or a separate office to perform first aid, emergency aid, and initial treatment for students when they have accidents, injuries, or common illnesses during their study time.

In the medical room of Vinh Tan Secondary School (Vinh city), there are posted the 8 duties of school health workers and 13 school safety criteria. Photo: Thanh Hien

The use of primary health care funds has been effectively implemented by schools, from providing guidance on personal hygiene, nutritional hygiene, environmental hygiene to disease prevention, periodic health check-ups, first aid for accidents and sudden illnesses, taking students to the doctor and enjoying benefits and regimes.Health insuranceThanks to regular health care and check-ups at school, many students have had their diseases such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, scoliosis, dental diseases, infectious diseases, etc. detected early, so that they can be treated promptly, avoiding long-term effects on their health.

Many benefits when participating in school health insurance

In addition to the right to primary health care at schools, when sick, students are guaranteed the right to medical examination and treatment at medical facilities. In the 2021-2022 school year, the whole province had 181,511 students go to medical facilities in the province for examination and treatment with a payment of nearly 74 billion VND. Of which, 162,164 were outpatients; 19,347 were inpatients. 2,552 students went to medical facilities outside the province for examination and treatment, with a total amount paid by the Health Insurance Fund of over 10 billion VND, of which: 1,670 were outpatients; 882 were inpatients.

In particular, some students whose medical treatment cost hundreds of millions of dong were paid by the Health Insurance Fund, helping their families overcome difficulties, such as: Pham Thi Bich Ngoc (Vinh city) was paid 357,603,108 VND by the Health Insurance Fund; Tran Thien Minh (Vinh city) was paid 258,965,884 VND by the Health Insurance Fund; Nguyen Duc Quang (Vinh city) was paid 238,974,323 VND by the Health Insurance Fund; Nguyen Thi Mai (Yen Thanh) was paid 232,130,214 VND by the Health Insurance Fund; Dau Duc Nang (Hoang Mai town) was paid 139,026,508 VND by the Health Insurance Fund; Pham Trinh Minh Tue (Thanh Chuong district) was paid 150,941,839 VND by the Health Insurance Fund;...

Students who participate in health insurance will have many outstanding benefits. Photo courtesy of Thanh Chung

Students are also a group that receives state budget support for health insurance contributions. In the 2022-2023 school year, the monthly health insurance contribution for students is 4.5% of the base salary (equivalent to 4.5% x 1,490,000 = 67,050 VND/student/month and 804,600 VND/year). Of which, the state budget supports 30% of the contribution, so the actual amount that each student will pay is 46,935 VND/month, equivalent to 563,220 VND/year.

With the responsibility of organizing the implementation of health insurance policies, the Social Insurance sector has been making efforts to ensure health insurance benefits for students; strengthening administrative procedure reform in a simple and convenient way for students in health insurance participation procedures, using health insurance cards when going to medical examination and treatment... In particular, from June 2021, health insurance participants (including students) can use the image of the health insurance card on the VssID application instead of the paper health insurance card, to go to medical examination and treatment facilities.