The government may need to spend 4.6 trillion won ($4.3 billion) to establish a new hospital system that offers full nursing care to include assistance usually provided by patients’ family members, a study showed Tuesday.

South Korea currently has the lowest patient-to-nurse ratio among the OECD nations, at 0.28 nurses per patient. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development average is 1.25.

The system in which family members provide basic care normally carried out by nursing staff in developed countries has been partly blamed for the recent Middle East respiratory outbreak. Many people who contracted the virus here did so while caring for their family members at MERS-affected hospitals. 

The study, written by Hwang Na-mi at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs, predicted that it would require the government to spend 4.6 trillion won to offer full nursing care at 1,780 hospitals nationwide by 2020, and hire 47,922 more nurses to make it possible.

The budget also includes the cost of purchasing hygiene and safety equipment for medical facilities, as well as building separate rooms where inpatients can spend time with visitors, away from the wards, the study said.

Once the system is established, inpatients would face an increase in daily hospital bills of around 6,000 won to 10,000 won a day, but would not need to hire a personal care worker or have their family members look after them during hospital stays. The service would be provided by certified nurses.

The Health Ministry launched pilot programs for such services twice in the past, in 2007 and 2010. According to a 2013 study by the Korea Health Industry Development Institute, patients who benefitted from the program in 2007 on average gave 9.1 points out of 10 when asked about their satisfaction with the service.

Patients who experienced the pilot program in 2010 rated the service at 8.0-9.1 out of 10.

By Claire Lee (dyc@heraldcorp.com)