Directed by the National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC) Chinese medical experts from the Hunan Children's Hospital have been dispatched to the Cambodian National Children's Hospital in Phnom Penh to train local medical staff and give medical consultations to local sick children using standard pediatric medical skills.

This project will continue over the next three years. Chinese medical teams will use their knowledge to upgrade the Cambodian pediatric medical level.

To train pediatric professionals for Cambodia

"Children are the future of a nation. To safeguard all the children, helping them grow up healthily and happily is the duty and responsibility of every country and government," Li Bin, minister of the NHFPC said at the launching ceremony. She said that the rapid development of the global economy and globalization are creating abundant material wealth but also bringing about environmental issues, which directly threaten human health, especially children's.

Last September, China announced that in the next five years it will implement 100 maternal and child health projects in developing countries, including Cambodia, dispatching Chinese medical teams to provide assistance.

For a long time, the high mortality rate of new born babies and children has been the main threat in the Cambodian health sector. According to surveys of Cambodian population and health, one of every 36 children dies before reaching the age of one year. In recent years, the mortality rate of new born babies has been decreasing, but the proportion is still at a high level of 2.8 percent. 

"Our aim is to help Cambodia to train pediatric doctors, raising the medical level of Cambodian pediatrics and reducing child mortality," said Zhang Jian, director of the Hunan Health and Family Planning Commission. The maternal and child health project is expected to dispatch pediatric doctors and medical staff to Cambodia in the next three years, using the Cambodian National Children's Hospital as the training base to set up standardized intensive care units for new born babies and children and trying to establish a tiered system of medical pediatric care, Zhang said.

The president of the Cambodian National Children's Hospital expressed his gratitude to Chinese pediatricians for their help and was glad to see the maternal and child health project carried out in Cambodia. He said that neonatology is a public health sector that needs urgent development in Cambodia. The neonatology department of the Cambodian National Children’s Hospital has made significant improvements with the assistance of China’s advanced medical equipment and professionals, and the mortality rate of new born babies has been reduced.

To improve medical care level in a short time

The key task of the medical team of Hunan Children's Hospital is to improve the professional level of Cambodian medical staff.

In a three-day- training, Chinese medical experts gave lessons to Cambodian medical staff on life support, resuscitation of newborns, jaundice in newborns and diarrhea treatment. "These are the most needed pediatric medical techniques. We hope to improve the local medical care level through such training," said Wang Li, a member of the Chinese team.

The team not only gave medical lessons to local practitioners, but also offered free medical consultation to Cambodian sick children. 

"Do our best to help Cambodian medical staff"

"Thanks to the maternal and child health project, we know more about the situation of Cambodian pediatrics, and we also know exactly what medical techniques and equipment Cambodia badly needs," said Gao Xirong, a member of the Chinese medical team and the director of NICU at Hunan Children's Hospital. She said that she and her colleagues will do their best to help Cambodian medical staff.

So far, Sino-Cambodian health cooperation has led to many achievements based on Cambodian people's needs. The Cambodian government is grateful for China's medical assistance. Li Bin said that health cooperation is meaningful for both countries in deepening their comprehensive strategic partnership as well as in bringing benefits to the people of both nations.