Hospital denies links to ambulance that charged more than 5 million dong for 16 kilometers

A family in Thanh Hoa said it paid more than 5 million Vietnamese dong to transport a seriously ill man about 16 kilometers from hospital to home, then paid another 4.2 million dong for seven vials of medicine sold during the journey.

Huynh Tu Khanh, from Sam Son Ward, reported the case to authorities and posted it on social media. He said his family hired a vehicle on Aug. 14 to take his 58-year-old father, identified as H.B.D., from Thanh Hoa General Hospital back home. A man wearing a white coat allegedly advised the family to buy vasoactive medicine to prolong the patient’s life, charging 600,000 dong per vial.

The hospital said the vehicle belonged to an outside provider and that the man selling the medicine was not a hospital employee. It said the patient had been admitted on Aug. 1 with septic shock, multiple-organ failure and other illnesses. Because his condition was severe and he responded poorly to treatment, the family requested to take him home and arranged transportation themselves.

The hospital said its ambulances transport emergency patients or seriously ill patients who have an approved referral. It said there is currently no rule requiring hospitals to transport patients who face a high risk of death, or patients who have already died, when families want to take them home.

Thanh Hoa’s Health Department said that, as of Sept. 4, no independent emergency or patient-transport provider in the province had received an operating license from the department. It ordered medical facilities to strengthen oversight and banned staff from directing patients to outside transport operators for personal gain or allowing outside vehicles to solicit patients regularly on hospital grounds.