First Hospital in Bhutan

Before the 1950s, there was no modern medical facility of any kind in Bhutan. All healing was practised through Sowa Rigpa — the traditional Himalayan medical system — by practitioners trained in monastery schools. Surgery, germ theory, vaccination, and pharmaceutical medicine were entirely absent. The establishment of Bhutan's first modern dispensary and hospital in the 1950s, and its rapid expansion under the Third King's development plans, represents one of the most dramatic transitions in the country's history.

The First Doctors and the First Dispensary

Modern medical services in Bhutan began not with a hospital but with a single practitioner. Dr Tobgyel, Bhutan's first physician trained to MBBS standard, began work at Kungarapten in 1951 before being sent for further training in 1952. By 1954 he was serving at the Dechencholing Palace in Thimphu, providing medical care to the royal family and, through them, access to at least one qualified doctor for those who could reach the capital.

The entire modern health delivery system for the Thimphu valley originated from a one-room dispensary at Tashichhodzong. This modest beginning — a single room, a single doctor, and whatever medicines could be transported across mountain passes — was the seed from which the capital's health infrastructure grew.

A more substantial facility followed. A twenty-bed hospital of local architecture was constructed in Thimphu under the direction of the Third King, Jigme Dorji Wangchuck, and completed in 1956. Though small by any international standard, this building represented a genuine institutional commitment to modern medicine: a dedicated structure, staffed on a permanent basis, equipped to treat inpatients.

The First Five-Year Plan and Rapid Expansion

The decisive acceleration came with the First Five-Year Plan (1961–66), which placed healthcare alongside roads and education as a priority for national development. The Thimphu Hospital underwent formal development in 1961, and by the end of that year there were eleven clinics distributed across various locations in the country, alongside two hospitals — in Thimphu and Samtse (in the southern foothills).

India provided substantial assistance in establishing this infrastructure, consistent with its broader role as Bhutan's development partner. Indian doctors, nurses, and medical equipment arrived as part of the cooperation that also funded road construction and school-building. The dispensaries opened during the 1960s — followed by Basic Health Units in Trongsa and Bumthang in the early 1970s — began to extend the reach of modern medicine beyond the capital for the first time.

Alongside Western medicine, Bhutan also formalised its traditional healthcare system. The Indigenous Dispensary opened at Dechencholing on 28 June 1968, staffed by doctors trained in Tibet in Sowa Rigpa, represents the institutional recognition of traditional medicine as a parallel system rather than a relic to be discarded. The integration of modern and traditional medicine into a single national health system, rather than their competition, has been a consistent feature of Bhutanese health policy.

Growth to a National System

From the foundation laid in the 1950s and 1960s, Bhutan's healthcare system expanded to encompass district hospitals in all twenty dzongkhags, sub-district hospitals, and a national network of Basic Health Units reaching remote communities accessible only by trail. The Jigme Dorji Wangchuck National Referral Hospital in Thimphu, opened in 1972 and subsequently expanded, became the apex of this system, offering specialist services including surgery, radiology, and intensive care.

Bhutan introduced the principle of free healthcare for all citizens as a constitutional right, enshrined in the 2008 Constitution. This commitment, maintained even as the country has faced fiscal pressure, reflects a national consensus about the relationship between state and citizen that has its origins in the transformative decision, made in the 1950s, to bring modern medicine to a kingdom that had previously relied entirely on traditional healers.

References

1. Ministry of Health, Royal Government of Bhutan. "Overview." moh.gov.bt, accessed 2026.
2. Druk Journal. "Bhutanese Health and the Health Care System: Past, Present, and Future." drukjournal.bt, accessed 2026.
3. Tshering, Tobgay and Dorji, Thinley. "Progress and Delivery of Health Care in Bhutan." Tropical Medicine & International Health 16, no. 9 (2011): 1086–1091.
4. Pem, Dorji. "History of Emergency Medicine in Bhutan." International Journal of Emergency Medicine 17, no. 1 (2024). PMC10802050.