Chang Yung-Fa Charity Foundation has long been dedicated to the care for social welfare groups across Taiwan and noticed that elders in most remote areas often neglected their own health due to lack of health knowledge or living in remote areas. As such, the Foundation, Digital Humanitarian Association and WaCare (Remote Online Health Promotion Scheme) worked together to sponsor 10 community long-term care stations utilizing technology to solve the problem of insufficient health promotion resources in remote areas.

Chang Yung-Fa Charity Foundation held a Remote Online Health Promotion Scheme launch at the Yunlin County Government the other day. The Foundation chairman, Wu Jing-Ming, said, “We hope to solve the currently unevenly distributed medical resources, insufficient healthcare personnel and professional education in remote areas through the remote health promotion platform, which can also effectively improve the elders’ health awareness as the pandemic in recent years has generated the restriction of social distancing. Further, such front-line preventative medicine, once in place, shall effectively reduce the elders’ visit to the hospital for acute medical conditions and achieve delayed incapacity.

Pan Ren-Hao who is both the founder of WaCare and the secretary general of Digital Humanitarian Association stated, “The WaCare remote health platform enables healthcare promotion and clinic service in long-term care stations in remote rural areas by accessing a medical talent databank of over 1000 medical professionals. Likewise, the healthcare or medical specialists need not endure the long distances and inconvenient transportation but can give online teaching or consultation right where they are. Such a platform brings together health promotion to the community and bridge the gap of health promotion resources among different regions, while bringing people closer together.

Zhang Li-Shan Yunlin County Mayor expressed gratitude for the Foundation bringing to Yunlin County services that could delay incapacity among the elders. Yunlin County has a rather high percentage of senior population, and the pandemic has recently confined the elders to their homes. Elders lacking physical activities and social participation are prone to mental and physical health issues. The remote health platform helps keep the elders engaged in regular workouts at home. Plus, a balanced diet and sufficient sleep, they will have their bodily functions and immunity enhanced. The platform offers diversified courses to improve the elders’ health-related knowledge and allow the elders to grow old and healthy in their familiar local environments.

According to the statics of the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) of Executive Yuan, in 2019, the estimate of the average number of additional years that an unhealthy person can live is 8.5 (meaning the number of years when an unhealthy person would depend on other people for care), which will incur a cost of about NT$600,000 per year and at least NT$5.1 million for 8.5 years, if the care costs about NT$50,000 per month. If incapacity can be delayed or prevented in advance, it will reduce extra care costs and lessen the burden on the family. The Foundation has long been dedicated to medical care in remote rural areas, working in tandem with many university volunteer medicine corps to conduct free clinic service in rural areas across Taiwan and funding medical equipment and vehicles in hospitals, besides providing emergency financial aid for disadvantaged remote rural folks’ medical care. The Foundation will continue with its effort in bridging the urban-rural medical resources.

#Chang Yung-Fa Charity Foundation #Digital Humanitarian Association #WaCare Remote Health #Remote Online Health Promotion #Care for medical care in remote rural areas #Yunlin County Government