In April 2026, a specialized eye-screening program for children was conducted smoothly in kindergartens across the Chuanghui Community in Xi'an High-tech Zone. Under the guidance of medical staff, four-year-old Guoguo obediently opened her eyes wide and cooperated fully with the examination. Guoguo is one of more than 2,600 children who benefited from this screening initiative, which covered multiple kindergartens in the Chuanghui Community.
This is a typical snapshot from the “Youth and Children’s Public Health Initiative” series of charitable activities organized by Xi’an Qidi Children’s Hospital. Yet, when we place this scene within the policy context of the nation’s newly launched “Five-Health Promotion Action Plan for Children and Adolescents (2026–2030),” this kindergarten screening—benefiting over 2,600 families—ceases to be merely a simple free medical consultation. Rather, it stands as a vivid testament to how a modern, tertiary-level children’s specialist hospital is responding with professional expertise to the challenges of our times.
Under the “Five Healths”: A health initiative that shapes the nation’s future by the end of 2025, the National Health Commission and 12 other departments jointly issued the “Five-Health Promotion Action Plan for Children and Adolescents,” focusing on five key areas: weight, vision, mental health, bone health, and oral health. The plan explicitly states that by 2030, major health indicators for children and adolescents should reach or exceed the levels of developed countries. This signifies that child health management is undergoing a comprehensive transformation—from a focus on “treating illness when it occurs” to a model that emphasizes “prevention first, combined with treatment and prevention.”
For this concentrated screening targeting multiple kindergartens in the Chuanghui community, the hospital dispatched an ophthalmology specialist team equipped with portable binocular vision screening devices and other necessary equipment to provide on-site services. The screening program covers not only routine indicators such as visual acuity and refractive error but also includes risk assessments for strabismus and amblyopia. For children identified with abnormal results during the screening, the hospital has established a referral pathway to guide parents in taking their children to the hospital for further diagnosis and intervention.
The ophthalmic screening in kindergarten classrooms is just one aspect of a broader effort—within Xi'an Qidi Children’s Hospital, specialized equipment and expert teams covering the other four dimensions of the “Five Health” concept are already fully prepared. The “Five Health” philosophy has been deeply integrated into its service system through a dual-track model of “community initial screening plus hospital-based detailed diagnosis.”
Vision Care: Throughout 2025, we will organize multiple free eye health clinics focused on eye care, and establish refractive development records for thousands of children.
Bone Health: The hospital is equipped with an ultrasonic spinal screening device and a gait analysis system. Children identified during community initial screenings as having uneven shoulders or postural abnormalities can be admitted to the hospital for precise assessments.
Weight Health: In community free clinics and kindergarten entrance physical examinations, we use height and weight measurements to conduct a preliminary screening for the risk of overweight and obesity. Within the hospital, we rely on body composition analyzers to develop personalized dietary and exercise plans for children who have been diagnosed.
Mental Health: On-site professional psychological assessment and parenting guidance are provided. Children suspected of developmental or behavioral deviations will be referred to the hospital’s outpatient clinic for psychological and behavioral evaluation and intervention.
Oral Health: We’ve launched a dental caries screening program. Portable examination devices can be used to conduct preliminary screenings at community events, while also encouraging parents to develop an awareness of regular oral health check-ups.
Each screening represents an opportunity for health education, and every report serves as an introduction to scientific parenting. This service model—“using screening to promote prevention, and using prevention to guide treatment”—is precisely the most authentic manifestation of the “Five-Health Initiative”.
From a hardware perspective, the hospital has a total investment exceeding 1.2 billion yuan and a building area of 120,000 square meters, with a planned capacity of 400 beds. The hospital is equipped with a range of specialized devices, including the German MAICO hearing screening device, the U.S. WelchAllyn binocular vision screening device, an ultrasonic bone densitometer, an ultrasonic spinal screening device, and an Inbody body composition analyzer—providing robust support for precise screening and intervention across five major health areas.
From a software perspective, the hospital leverages the robust medical expertise of Xi'an Children's Hospital and has assembled a team of pediatric specialists from top-tier Grade-III hospitals across Northwest China to serve as discipline leaders. The departments closely associated with the "Five Healths"—including pediatric health care, ophthalmology, and integrated traditional Chinese and Western medicine—are each headed by experts such as Wang Chaohui, the founder of the former Xi'an Fourth Hospital’s Children’s Health Care Center; Pan Aijie, former director of the Ophthalmology Department at the Northwest Women and Children’s Hospital; and Zhang Jinhu, former director of the East District of Xi'an Children's Hospital. These specialists have also established multidisciplinary collaboration mechanisms with various departments within the hospital. This means that any health concerns—such as vision abnormalities, postural issues, developmental delays, or dental caries—detected during screenings in communities and childcare institutions can be swiftly referred through the hospital’s internal referral system to the appropriate specialized departments. Thus, screening and intervention are seamlessly integrated, and prevention and treatment are deeply intertwined.
