Shared Nurse Apps Raise Concerns in China's Biggest Cities

By Bailey Hu, June 20, 2018

Just when you thought China's share economy couldn't produce any more shocking gimmicks – especially after bed-sharing's meteoric rise and fall – 'shared nurse' apps started making headlines in recent weeks.

It turns out that multiple apps in China have been quietly making inroads in cities by allowing patients and their families to book at-home appointments with healthcare providers, including professional nurses.

Services across apps include injections, transfusions, withdrawing blood, administering medicine and urethral catherization, according to Shenzhen Evening News. Other outlets have also reported nurses using traditional Chinese medicine, and providing postoperational or postnatal care.

Nurse-sharing apps were launched as early as 2016 in Shandong province, CGTN reports, and have since spread to other provinces and first-tier cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

But while the services, which typically charge more than hospitals, have brought patients convenience, they're also raising concerns among experts due to lack of governmental regulation.

For one, there are no uniform standards or verification process for care providers employed by such apps. Instead, individual platforms follow internal guidelines to choose their nurses.

Reservation requirements also vary for patients: according to Shenzhen Evening News, one nurse-sharing app only requires a national ID number, address and description of one's medical condition to book an appointment with a healthcare worker. By contrast, other local apps require patients to upload documents and input types of medication, then wait for manual verification before their RSVPs can be made.

And although some platforms purchase medical insurance for both patients and staff, there are currently no requirements that all apps do so.

That may change in the future, however – China's National Sanitation Health Committee has announced that they plan to gradually improve current legislation on the management of nurses and introduce new legislation that specifically applies to app platforms.

The superintendent of Shenzhen People's Hospital's nursing department, Wu Huiping, told Shenzhen Evening News that it's currently legal for nurses in Guangdong to work on sharing platforms, and that doing so may reduce the burden on hospital clinics in the city.

However, she advises app users to always check a care provider's credentials online first, and make sure that the nurse matches up with the description given on the app. And even then, take care – in case a medical emergency does occur during a procedure, most people's homes lack the equipment that a hospital can provide.

[Cover image via Nurse at the Door]