GD names 25 international hospitals, 4 in SZ

Four Shenzhen hospitals are among the first group of 25 hospitals in Guangdong Province selected to pilot international medical services.

These include Shenzhen People’s Hospital in Luohu, Peking University Shenzhen Hospital in Futian, the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital (HKU-SZH) in Nanshan, and Shenzhen Hospital of Southern Medical University in Bao’an.

HKU-SZH, for instance, has already served over 1 million Hong Kong and Macao residents over the years, with traditional Chinese medicine, orthopedics, and cardiology being the most sought-after departments.

According to a press conference on March 27, Guangdong authorities approved the first group of 25 hospitals and will revise the list annually. Most of these hospitals are located in the Pearl River Delta and include well-known public hospitals and reputable traditional Chinese medicine hospitals.

A total of 25 hospitals in Guangdong are selected as pilots for international medical services.

These hospitals will provide full-cycle services, including diagnosis, treatment, chronic disease management, physical exams, rehabilitation, and medical cosmetology. Benefiting from the Hong Kong and Macao Medicines and Medical Devices Connect program, the hospitals can access urgently needed drugs and devices that are otherwise not available on the Chinese mainland.

International medical services are limited to patients with international commercial insurance and those who pay out of pocket, as these services are not covered by China’s basic medical insurance scheme. Hospitals will set their own pricing for international services.

Resources for each participating hospital’s core and international services will be kept separate. Doctors will need to fulfill their regular outpatient quotas before taking on work in the international division.

Many expats who have seen a doctor in China shared that they experienced affordable, efficient, and safe medical services. Videos posted under the hashtag “Medical Tourism” have been viewed more than 300 million times on TikTok.

Shenzhen, in fact, published a three-year action plan in 2024 to pilot international medical services in two phases. A total of 25 hospitals in the city have launched such pilots following international medical standards.

From 2023 to 2025, the number of outpatient and emergency visits by overseas patients in Shenzhen increased from 784,000 to 1.359 million, with an average annual growth rate of 31.7%. Inpatient admissions rose from 15,000 to 26,000, representing an average annual increase of 33.6%.

Wu Hongyan, director of the Shenzhen Municipal Health Commission, said the city again introduced 26 measures in March 2025 to support wholly foreign-owned hospitals and promote health-themed blocks near checkpoints in Futian, Luohu, and Nanshan. So far, the city has one foreign-owned hospital and 14 Hong Kong- or Macao-invested clinics.

Shenzhen has continuously improved its international medical services. Eight hospitals have launched multilingual appointment and registration platforms, nine hospitals have deployed international telemedicine systems, 12 municipal-level medical institutions have enabled direct billing arrangements with international commercial insurance companies, seven medical institutions allow the use of Hong Kong’s Elderly Health Care Vouchers, and two medical and nursing care institutions have been included in Hong Kong’s Residential Care Services Scheme.

Province-wide, the number of foreign nationals seeking medical treatment jumped by more than 20% last year, while demand for inpatient services surged by 76%.