NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2006

FEATURE

HMI opens Beijing regional office to pursue opportunities in China

For the last two decades, the Chinese health care system has been undergoing a gradual but major transformation. A multitude of factors have led to efforts by the government to expand health care services throughout the country, open the health care market to foreign and private investment, and investigate ways to enhance professional development and education opportunities for clinicians, nurses, and administrators. Now HMI, which has been actively working with Chinese health care organizations for the last several years, has established a regional office in Beijing in order to forge partnerships with organizations in China.

Roman Xu heads HMI’s new office in China.

“China’s health care reform movement presents a tremendous opportunity for HMI to develop and introduce innovative models of health care delivery, education, and research, and help create centers of excellence that could have far-ranging impacts on how care is delivered throughout the country,” said Robert K. Crone, MD, president and chief executive officer of HMI.

The Beijing office is headed by Roman (Dong) Xu, MPP, a native of Chengdu in the Sichuan Province. Xu first came into contact with HMI as a member of the Chinese Medical Association, which co-sponsored a major HMI conference in 2000 that brought over 600 Chinese health care professionals to the United States. He will work closely with HMI’s Boston-based team to develop programs and partnerships aligned with the specific challenges facing organizations in China and the Asia-Pacific region.

In addition to the desire to develop more high-quality general medical and specialty hospitals in China, there is an acknowledged need to provide health care management training, particularly for the top administrators in the Chinese system with chiefly clinical backgrounds.

HMI is certainly not new to the Chinese health care and education landscape. At Xinjiang Medical University (XMU), in Urumqi, HMI is working closely with scientists in the school’s Cardiovascular Research Center to define standards and practices for research, and expose XMU researchers in other disciplines to new laboratory techniques and technologies (see the Feature article on XMU in this issue). HMI also has a long-standing alliance with Hua Shan Hospital in Shanghai.

HMI’s Robert K. Crone and Albert Gillis with Dr. James Fang of the Xiamen University-Fupond International Hospital.

In 2006 HMI embarked on two hospital development initiatives with partners in China. The Xiamen University-FuPond International Hospital will be a 500-bed general medical/surgical hospital to serve the people of Xiamen, the province of Fujian, and southeast China. A delegation from Xiamen University visited Boston in September to tour facilities in the Harvard Medical School community and move forward planning efforts with HMI. Another hospital development project on the horizon is the Beijing-United States International Medical Center (BIMC). HMI and the leadership of BIMC are collaborating on the development of a 500-bed general medical/surgical tertiary care teaching hospital to be located in the Tongzhou District of Beijing. In addition, the planned facility will include a center to support postgraduate education and cutting-edge research in the life sciences.

In October the new Beijing office was officially registered by the People’s Republic of China. Interested parties may contact the office by phone at 86-10-65308144/45. The office address is:

Beijing Fortune Plaza
Building A  Room 612
#7 Dongsanhua Zhonglu
Chaoyang District
Beijing 100020, China

Copyright 2006 Harvard Medical International