"Offering 300 Million Won Annual Salary with Apartment and Villa"… Danyang's Bold Move to Attract Specialists

8 Years of Emergency Medical Gap After Closure of Danyang Seoul Hospital
"Even If We Pay More, We Want Specialists with Over 10 Years of Experience"

Danyang, Chungbuk is making every effort to secure specialists ahead of the opening of its Public Health Medical Center scheduled for July next year. They have attached conditions such as paying an annual salary of over 300 million KRW and providing apartments and vacation homes once hired.

On the 26th of last month, Danyang County, which built the county-run Public Health Medical Center building, plans to conduct a one- to two-month pilot operation starting in May next year and open the county medical center equipped with specialists around July.

On the 26th, at the auditorium of the Citizens' Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ) in Jongno-gu, Seoul, CCEJ officials held up placards during the press conference titled "Announcement on the Actual Condition of Medical Personnel Supply and Demand and Urging the Expansion of Medical School Quotas."
[Photo by Yonhap News]

To this end, they plan to announce recruitment for four specialists. The recruitment fields are two emergency medicine specialists, one internal medicine specialist, and one psychiatry specialist, totaling four. Candidates will be selected through document screening and interviews, and depending on the medical specialty, an annual salary ranging from the high 200 million KRW to the high 300 million KRW range will be offered.

In addition, welfare benefits such as providing accommodation for medical staff, vacation homes, and discount coupons for tourist facilities will be given. Four 20-pyeong (66㎡) apartments located in Danyang-eup will be purchased and remodeled to be provided to the specialists. Additionally, one-room accommodations will be supported for public health doctors and nurses.

Also, three houses within the ‘Byeoldareun Donghwa Village (22 households)’ in Danseong-myeon, where recreational facilities and country houses are being developed, will be provided as vacation homes for the director of the Public Health Medical Center and specialists. Free and discounted access to tourist facilities such as Mancheonha Sky and Gosu Cave has also been arranged for the families of medical staff who visit Danyang on weekends.

Danyang County, a depopulated area with a population of about 27,700, experienced an eight-year gap in emergency medical services after Danyang Seoul Hospital closed due to financial difficulties in 2015. While simple emergency care is handled by the county-run nursing hospital, severe patients must be transferred to other regions unconditionally.

In response, the county built the Danyang Public Health Medical Center with 30 inpatient beds at a cost of 16.5 billion KRW starting in 2019.

Despite the exceptional treatment, securing specialists remains uncertain because few doctors prefer rural areas with insufficient living conditions.

Sancheong County in Gyeongnam found a doctor after five announcements in June, offering an annual salary of 360 million KRW. Sokcho Medical Center in Gangwon Province secured three emergency room doctors within three months by offering an annual salary of 400 million KRW in April.

Gu Do-eun, team leader of Danyang Public Health Center, said, "We will have to see the recruitment results, but if there are no applicants, we will have no choice but to raise the salary. Unlike other public health medical centers, there is the difficulty of establishing hospital personnel management and medical systems at the initial stage of opening. We plan to bring in experienced specialists even if we have to pay more."

Kim Moon-geun, mayor of Danyang County, also stated, "Our goal is to bring in specialists with more than 10 years of experience. For regions like Danyang with poor medical systems, long-term government measures are needed, such as requiring prior work experience at metropolitan medical centers before opening local medical centers or establishing specialized medical schools to train local medical personnel."

Even if specialists are secured as planned, the annual operating costs amounting to tens of billions of KRW remain a burden. Unlike local medical centers that receive half of their operating costs from national funds, Public Health Medical Centers do not receive national support for operating expenses except for building construction and equipment procurement.

According to Danyang County’s own research, operating eight medical departments including internal medicine, psychiatry, pediatrics, and obstetrics and gynecology requires about 5 to 6 billion KRW annually. Considering the medical demand conditions in the Danyang area, it is estimated that an annual deficit of 3 to 4 billion KRW will occur.