Taiwan's National Health Insurance at the Emergency Department following the COVID-19 outbreak

Taiwan's National Health Insurance (NHI) is a widely acclaimed universal healthcare system. In the past few years, particularly following the COVID-19 outbreak, challenges related to maintaining the NHI system have surfaced. Since 2020, NHI has faced a series of challenges, including excessive patient visits to the hospital emergency department, a lack of an effective primary care and referral system, and a high turnover rate of healthcare workers. We review major problems related to Taiwan's NHI, emphasizing input from frontline healthcare workers. We provide recommendations for potential policies addressing the concerns around NHI, for example, strengthening the role of primary care services under the NHI administration, reducing the high turnover rate of healthcare workers, and increase the premium and copayments. We hope that this policy analysis may allow policymakers and scholars to understand both the merits and critical problems related to NHI from the clinical perspective.

Automated summary

Taiwan's NHI is a universal healthcare system that has received widespread acclaim, but it has faced challenges in recent years, including excessive hospital visits, a lack of primary care and referral system, and high turnover rate of healthcare workers. This review highlights the major problems and recommendations for policies such as strengthening primary care services, reducing turnover rate, and increasing premiums and copayments. The aim is to provide policymakers and scholars with a clinical perspective on the merits and critical issues of NHI.