Why Macau spends millions to send its patients to Hong Kong – some by air

Macau resident Mrs Chan visits Hong Kong at least four times a year, for appointments with a dentist, gynaecologist, dermatologist or other medical professional. The public relations officer consults doctors in her hometown only for minor ailments, such as a cold, she says. That’s because medical professionals she encounters in Macau speak Cantonese with a mainland Chinese accent, and that worries her.

“I might see a specialist in Macau, but for a second opinion I always go to Hong Kong. A Kiang Wu gynaecologist told me I needed to get a fibroid removed,” Chan says, referring to the former Portuguese enclave’s largest private hospital. “After getting a second opinion from a doctor in Hong Kong, I had surgery performed there.”

Chan (who does not want to reveal her full name) is typical of many Macau residents, who distrust the city’s hospitals and seek specialist treatment in Hong Kong. The majority of doctors working in Macau’s hospitals are graduates from medical schools in mainland China.

She doesn’t trust them, Chan says, because of bad experiences friends have had in hospitals in China and Macau. Additionally, most people in the city grew up watching Hong Kong soap operas that projected an image of Hong Kong doctors as professional and highly skilled.

Macau has three major hospitals, Kiang Wu Hospital, publicly funded Centro Hospitalar Conde de São Januário, and the University Hospital at Macau University of Science and Technology.

Kiang Wu employs more than 340 doctors, a third of whom are graduates of Zhongshan School of Medicine, while another third trained at Jinan University’s school of medicine; both schools are in Guangzhou. The remainder qualified at other universities in China or Taiwan. Its more than 800 nursing staff earned their certificates in nursing schools at Kiang Wu Hospital, Macao Polytechnic Institute or in China.