Quanzhentong: Building a Digital Clinic Platform to Empower 900,000 Primary Healthcare Institutions Nationwide

At the Wuhan Fangcang Shelter Hospital, numerous posters are prominently displayed. These promote the “Love in Fighting the Epidemic” psychological aid public welfare campaign, organized by the China Association for Disaster Prevention. By simply scanning a QR code, patients and medical staff can access free counseling services provided by nearly 1,000 psychological counselors.

This public welfare initiative for psychological support is technically supported by Wennuan Technology. Upon learning that the China Association for Disaster Prevention would host a psychological aid campaign, the company immediately decided to provide free setup of online consultation rooms. Since the launch of this charitable program, it has delivered psychological counseling services to a large number of healthcare workers and patients.

Wen Nuan Tech, founded in 2016, is a pioneer in digital healthcare, dedicated to helping small and medium-sized medical and health institutions enhance their diagnostic and treatment service capabilities.The company’s flagship product, All-In-One Clinic, is a digital clinic workflow platform that provides one-stop outpatient digitization solutions for clinics, making clinical diagnosis and treatment more efficient, safer, and more precise.

As the COVID-19 pandemic erupted, all clinics suspended operations. As a software service provider for clinics, WenNuan Technology should have also been shut down. However, Xue Chong, the company’s founder and CEO, stated, “This has been our busiest Spring Festival ever.”

Developing an early warning system for COVID-19 and launching an online store to supply protective equipment... During this Spring Festival, Xue Chong led his company’s team in working overtime on research and development, often discussing plans until the early hours of the morning. They completed project after project, making significant contributions to epidemic prevention and control while also generating substantial revenue for the company.

Following the outbreak, cities such as Harbin, Hefei, and Zhengzhou issued directives requiring clinics to suspend operations to contain the epidemic. However, the drawbacks of clinic closures soon became apparent. On one hand, clinics suffered financial losses; on the other, patients with common and chronic conditions were unable to receive timely treatment, leading to delays in care and worsening of their conditions.Under such circumstances, the advantages of online consultations began to emerge. Wennuan Technology provided clinics with free online consultation modules, enabling them to continue serving patients during the pandemic.

In addition, Qi Ge Yi Sheng, a subsidiary of Wennuan Technology, has organized specialists from various departments of affiliated hospitals of renowned medical schools to host more than 10 online public welfare lectures in succession. These sessions provided Q&A and science popularization on topics such as home-based chronic disease management, fever symptoms, and home rehabilitation. The company plans to invite multiple top-tier physicians to deliver further lectures in the near future.

Meanwhile, as local governments gradually allow businesses to resume operations and a large number of clinics reopen, it is crucial to prevent cluster transmission of COVID-19 during diagnosis and treatment in primary healthcare institutions, and to assist primary care physicians in achieving “early detection, early reporting, and early diagnosis” of suspected COVID-19 cases.

Researchers at Wennuan Technology worked overtime during the Spring Festival holiday to develop the “Intelligent Early Warning System for COVID-19 Based on Outpatient Electronic Medical Records,”Leverage big data and artificial intelligence to assist primary care physicians in efficient screening, and enable governments to conduct timely monitoring and early intervention.This early warning system assists primary healthcare institutions in analyzing patients’ chief complaints, intelligently screening for suspected cases, issuing immediate alerts upon identification, and prompting the institutions to report relevant information.

While contributing to society, enterprises must also ensure their survival and pursue development. The prolonged and widespread nature of the pandemic has dealt a severe blow to a large number of businesses. Xue Chong described his feelings at the onset of the outbreak as “anxious,” noting that “when the epidemic erupted, many of our operations were halted, foreshadowing that our February revenue might come to nothing.”However, Xue Chong believes that addressing the challenges of the pandemic requires a proactive attitude; laying off staff or disbanding teams is a short-sighted approach that is detrimental to the company’s long-term development.He began to contemplate how to better serve customers, generate revenue for the company, and offset the losses incurred during the pandemic.

During the pandemic, nothing drew more attention than the supply of protective equipment. Following the resumption of outpatient services, clinics are expected to see a surge in demand for such supplies. Building a medical supply chain to provide protective equipment to clinics may be a viable solution. WenNuan Tech has long envisioned establishing such a medical supply chain and has made extensive preparations in advance.During the pandemic, the company prioritized the development of an online marketplace, initiated collaborations with manufacturers, integrated its logistics system, and rapidly launched the platform.

“Generally, it takes at least three months to set up an online medical marketplace, but we did it in less than 20 days,” said Xue Chong. Currently, WenNuan’s online marketplace meets clinics’ procurement needs for protective supplies, consumables, and commonly used medications.“Thanks to our online store, our operating revenue did not decline during the pandemic.”

Wen Nuan Technology’s team is a quintessential example of medical-engineering integration. Its core R&D team comprises not only IT technology experts but also senior physicians. Founder and CEO Xue Chong graduated from Peking Union Medical College in 2010 with a clinical doctorate in surgery. In 2013, Xue Chong pursued postdoctoral research at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. The co-founder was formerly a senior technology expert at Alibaba, and most of the company’s engineers have many years of overseas IT work experience.The integration of medical and engineering expertise enables Wennuan Technology to identify pain points in the diagnostic and treatment process, align closely with the practical needs of clinic physicians, and keenly perceive emerging trends and opportunities in healthcare, thereby allowing for timely adjustments to its strategy and focus.

In recent years, the strengthening of primary healthcare has coexisted with the expansion of hospital scale. Outpatient and inpatient rates have increased, outpatient visits at primary care facilities have continued to rise, and health resources have been further improved. Data shows that as of November 2018, there were 950,000 primary healthcare institutions, 633,000 village clinics, and 228,000 private clinics in China.

On the other hand, the pain points faced by small medical institutions, such as clinics, also warrant attention. These institutions offer a limited range of services, primarily focused on medication dispensing, and lack the capacity to provide higher-value-added medical services such as laboratory testing, diagnostic examinations, and specialist consultations. Furthermore, challenges including extensive rather than refined management practices, low operational efficiency, and insufficient professional competence among physicians have constrained the sound development of small medical institutions.

WenNuan Tech was born against this backdrop.

All-In-One Clinic, a product under WenNuan Technology, integrates medical science with informatics to serve as a digital clinic workflow platform. It empowers clinicians to continuously and dynamically manage every patient health metric, enables clinic administrators to gain comprehensive visibility into operational data, and streamlines collaboration among practitioners, physicians, and nurses. By facilitating real-time transmission of medical device data to both providers and patients, and seamlessly connecting clinics with high-quality medical supply resources, the platform leverages artificial intelligence to support various stages of diagnosis and treatment. This ultimately makes clinic operations more efficient, safer, and more precise.

According to Xue Chong, in 2019, the company placed greater emphasis on intelligent assisted diagnosis and treatment by integrating an AI-assisted decision-making module into its outpatient system to provide clinical diagnostic support and medication guidance for physicians.Currently, All-In-One Clinic features rational drug use rules for 120,000 medications and provides auxiliary diagnosis and treatment support for over 30,000 diseases, meeting the daily clinical needs of clinic physicians and making the diagnostic and therapeutic process safer and more precise.

Currently, All-In-One Clinic is serving approximately 5,000 clinics, benefiting 2 million people.

Next, Wennuan Technology will continue to develop and optimize its products. Xue Chong aims to make All-In-One Clinic simpler and more intelligent, thereby enhancing the user experience. This will enable doctors who are less proficient with computers to easily adopt All-In-One Clinic, while also helping physicians improve their diagnostic and treatment capabilities with the aid of AI-assisted decision-making.