Jinan Municipal Health Commission Director Ma Xiao'en Advocates Leveraging Strengths and Innovation to Build a Leading Traditional Chinese Medicine City

On October 24, 2020, the 2nd World Conference on Internet Industry of Traditional Chinese Medicine (WCIICM2020) grandly opened in Jinan. Themed “Hometown of Bian Que • Health and Wellness Jinan—Development of the Internet-Enabled Big Health Industry for Traditional Chinese Medicine in the Post-Pandemic Era,” the conference provided an integrated platform for cooperation, exchange, and application discussions spanning “industry, academia, research, and application.” Top experts, scholars, industry leaders, and industrial representatives from around the world participated both online and offline, jointly exploring the high-quality, integrated development of Traditional Chinese Medicine and the internet industry.

At the conference, Ma Xiaoen, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Jinan Municipal Health Commission, as well as Director of the Jinan Municipal Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, delivered a keynote address on “Comprehensively Building Jinan into a Leading City in Traditional Chinese Medicine.”

Ma Xiaoen, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Jinan Municipal Health Commission, and Director of the Jinan Municipal Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine

The following are the main points of the speech:

Jinan City attaches great importance to the development of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) undertakings and industry. Leveraging our existing resources and aligning with the requirements of upholding fundamental principles while pursuing innovation in the new era, we have undertaken exploratory initiatives centered on building Jinan into a leading city for TCM.

Integrating into the overall urban development, the environment for the inheritance and innovation of traditional Chinese medicine continues to improve.The traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) industry is an integral part of Jinan’s initiative to build itself into an internationally renowned city for medical care and health wellness. Under Jinan’s plan to develop ten trillion-yuan industries, biopharmaceuticals and medical health wellness are advancing side by side. Meanwhile, Jinan ranks first in Shandong Province in the number of Grade 3A TCM hospitals, registered TCM clinics, and national-level key TCM specialties, laying a solid foundation for its development into a leading city in traditional Chinese medicine.

The service system continues to improve, and the network of traditional Chinese medicine services is becoming increasingly comprehensive.We have 39 TCM hospitals. All general hospitals and maternal and child health institutions at Level II or above have established TCM departments. All community health service centers and township health centers have built “Guoyitang” (TCM Halls), and 90% of community health service stations and village clinics have set up “TCM Corners.” We also established the nation’s first regional umbilical therapy alliance, comprising 120 member units, and founded the province’s first TCM diagnosis and treatment alliance for ulcerative diseases, thereby achieving integration, co-construction, and sharing within the academic network.

Provincial Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Preventive Healthcare Service Centers, Provincial Bases for Adolescent Vision Protection, and various specialized centers and disease-specific centers have enabled the sustained leverage of the distinctive advantages of TCM.

The inheritance and innovation of traditional Chinese medicine have been continuously deepened, significantly enhancing the development momentum of traditional Chinese medicine.As a national pilot city for private healthcare, we have explored and established the "Jinan Model" of a one-time completion filing system for traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) clinics. Currently, there are 429 filed TCM clinics, ranking first in the province and among the top nationwide.

We are vigorously piloting the “Smart Shared Traditional Chinese Medicine Pharmacy” service in Licheng District, Huaiyin District, and Pingyin County, with plans to roll it out citywide upon successful implementation; we have also entered into a strategic cooperation agreement with Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine on 15 projects to pool cultural resources.

Cultural Leadership Drives Integrated Development, Continuously Polishing the Golden Brand of “Bian Que’s Hometown.”We will uphold the equal emphasis on traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and Western medicine, building a distinctive TCM industrial cluster and establishing an integrated development framework for TCM that encompasses healthcare, pharmaceuticals, research, production, culture, and tourism.

In the north, accelerate the development of health and elderly care projects and the construction of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) characteristic towns; in the east, enhance TCM scientific and technological innovation capabilities and industrial upgrading; in the west, leverage the advantage of university clusters to achieve integrated development among universities, industries, and cities; in the south, strengthen TCM herb cultivation to establish branded production bases; and in the central region, focus on developing high-end TCM medical services and improving service efficiency.

By 2022, high-quality traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) services will be basically accessible to all, and the city’s TCM industry output value will reach the tens of billions of yuan.