Clinics in China: development and distribution analysis

Objective To learn the recent development and regional distribution of clinics in China. Methods Based on statistics and a nationwide survey of clinics in the country, a simple linear regression was made to find factors determining clinics regional distribution. Results Clinics in China were found to have grown sizably from 134 000 in 2008 to 155 000 in 2014; medical technology workers to 2.31 per clinic in 2014; and the total revenue of these clinics accounted for only 0.724% of all medical institutions, while there are more clinics in the east than the west regions in China. Conclusions The role of clinics in attracting high quality medical resources to primary care should be further enhanced for development of the hierarchical medical system in China. Key words: Clinic; Development; Distribution; Influencing factor