How do you use every dental subsidy you are entitled to? Recommendations, the voucher's 21 service points, the last year of the $500 reward, and six rules that change the bill before you go north, 2026

TL;DR Hong Kong has no public dental service for adults generally: the Department of Health's emergency dental service "handles pain relief and extraction only", and extraction is one tooth per visit (the English page says one tooth per visit and the Chinese does not; the Department of Health's press release of 13 May 2025 puts it in Chinese as "compared with the current emergency dental service, which handles one tooth per visit"). All seven other schemes have eligibility thresholds. The Elderly Health Care Voucher gives $2,000 a year with an account cap of $8,000, and dentists are one of 14 registered professions, with no sub-limit on dental use. The Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme runs for three years, with accumulation ending on 31 December 2026 — 2026 is the last accumulation year, but the $500 earned for 2026 can be used until 31 December 2027, and the two dates are not the same. And the reward's accumulation threshold is judged service by service, on the main reason for that attendance. Vouchers can be used at 21 service points in the Greater Bay Area; those 21 are the 19 "pilot scheme" institutions plus the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's two points, and those two belong to a different scheme with a name of its own — the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme, launched on 6 October 2015 and made permanent on 26 June 2019 — rather than 19 institutions having 21 points between them. Of the 21 service points, 20 have a published dental or stomatology department; the remaining one (the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre) has no departments listed on any of four official pages, and this article does not infer any on its behalf. As at 30 September 2025, the two Shenzhen clinics that provide dental services only accounted for 77.3% of all amounts claimed under the "pilot scheme", at an average of $1,650 and $2,122 per transaction — these are the voucher amounts claimed per transaction, not the price of dental treatment, and reading them as a price list will produce a wrong sum. This article gives no mainland dental prices and assesses no institution or dentist; whether a particular treatment suits you, and how many sessions it takes, is for a dentist to decide from the state of your mouth.

#Is there a "public dentist" in Hong Kong? Read this section first

Hong Kong has no public dental system where an adult can simply join a queue and be seen: the only adult dental service the Government provides directly is the emergency dental service, and its scope is pain relief and extraction, not even including fillings or scaling. The Department of Health's page on the latest arrangements for the emergency dental service (which states itself 30 July 2026) sets out a scope of pain relief or tooth extraction, not including fillings, scaling, dentures or bridge removal, with extraction before orthodontic treatment likewise outside the scope [Note 1].

⚠ The Chinese and English versions of that sentence do not agree, and what differs is a quantity limit. The English of the same page puts the scope as relief of pain and tooth extraction (one tooth per visit); the Chinese 「止痛或脫牙」 carries no such limit. It is not a sentence unique to the English: the Department of Health's press release of 13 May 2025 announcing the Community Dental Support Programme puts the same thing in Chinese as a comparison — compared with the current emergency dental service, which handles one tooth per visit, participants in the programme may have the number of teeth treated raised to a maximum of three teeth per visit [Note 2].

That is to say, extraction at the emergency dental service is one tooth per visit. Someone with several teeth giving trouble does not get them dealt with by winning one ballot — each tooth means registering again and entering the ballot again.

The same page gives the number of clinics as 11, all allocating places by online registration and ballot. From 1 January 2026 the emergency dental service is free for eligible persons, with a consultation fee of $850 for non-eligible persons. The page sets out the ballot arrangements in more detail than most accounts, and the detail is useful: the registration system came into service on 30 December 2024, and the "preliminary registration" queue for tickets ceased the same day; online registration for the ballot runs from 6 in the morning to half past 11 in the morning, and registration is not accepted where the following day is a Saturday or public holiday; half the places are reserved for a priority ballot for those aged 65 or above; and there is a compassionate mechanism setting aside 5 per cent of first-round ballot places for people who have registered repeatedly in the past 30 days without obtaining one [Note 3].

⚠ "Online registration" does not mean "no smartphone, no treatment". Both the Chinese and English of the same page carry a sentence explaining that anyone needing help to register may attend any clinic providing the emergency dental service between half past 8 and half past 11 in the morning and be assisted by staff on site, without using their own mobile phone or computer. Together with the 5 per cent compassionate places above, "cannot register" and "did not win the ballot" are two different things, and the Government has provided a route out of each.

In one sentence: the emergency dental service is emergency care, not dental care. Every other form of government dental support asks first which category you fall into and only then what you are entitled to. That governs how this article should be read — you have to know which eligibility box you are in before any of the sums apply.

• Aged 65 or above: the Elderly Health Care Voucher.
• Receiving a specified benefit, or granted a Hospital Authority medical fee waiver: the Community Dental Support Programme (CDSP).
• Aged 13 to 17: the Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents (PDCC).
• Living in a residential care home, or aged 60 or above and using a day care centre for the elderly: the Outreach Dental Care Programme for the Elderly (ODCP).
• Aged 18 or above with an intellectual disability or an autism spectrum disorder: Hand-in-Hand Toothcare (HTC).
• Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients: the dental treatment cost grant.
• Civil servants and eligible persons: the second phase of the Pilot Dental Service (Scaling) for Civil Servants and Eligible Persons (PDS2) — the Department of Health invites people in batches by text message, only one scaling is provided, and the service period runs to 28 February 2027. This route requires no application of your own and is not confined to the elderly.

⚠ For anyone who assumes "the Government has dentists, so I just queue": what you queue for is pain relief and extraction, and extraction is one tooth per visit. Scaling, fillings and dentures mean one of the seven eligibility routes above, or paying for it yourself.

#When and why did these schemes appear?

Two entirely separate origins: the voucher has been added to and widened profession by profession since 2009 and eventually went cross-boundary, while the CDSP and PDCC are new schemes that followed a review at the end of 2022. Knowing the origins explains why the voucher has no "dental list" while the CDSP has a priced schedule item by item.

The voucher line is set out on the scheme's own background page: the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital pilot launched on 6 October 2015; the eligible age fell from 70 to 65 on 1 July 2017; a limit of $2,000 every two years on optometry services was set on 26 June 2019, the reason being "to encourage the elderly to use vouchers on a range of primary healthcare services"; the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital line extended on 17 April 2023 to that hospital's Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre; the scope widened on 28 April 2023 to audiologists, dietitians, clinical psychologists and speech therapists under the Accredited Registers Scheme for Healthcare Professions; spouses were allowed to share vouchers from 28 July 2023, with electronic consent replacing paper; the three-year Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme launched on 13 November 2023; and the Greater Bay Area pilot scheme began on 19 February 2024.

⚠ The cross-boundary line contains two schemes, and the earlier of them has a formal name that most accounts reduce to "the other arrangement". It has a formal name — the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme — and predates the Greater Bay Area pilot by more than eight years. The originals from the voucher background page and that scheme's own background page are at [Note 4]; between them the two pages give three dates: launched 6 October 2015, made permanent 26 June 2019, and Huawei Lizhiyuan added 17 April 2023.

In one sentence: this is a separate scheme that was made permanent long ago, and not part of the Greater Bay Area pilot. That has a direct consequence for a reader: this scheme has its own set of pages on the voucher website (background, highlights, FAQ, publications, contact), and the dental scope and complaint routes discussed below appear only on that set — searching for "the other arrangement" will not find them.

So the voucher is a sum of money whose uses have widened over time, not a scheme designed for dentistry. It has no list of dental services precisely because it was never designed around service items.

The dental line's starting point is on the schemes' own introduction pages. The Community Dental Support Programme page says that in response to growing public demand for public dental services the Government set up the Working Group on Oral Health and Dental Care at the end of 2022 to review comprehensively the dental services the Government provides or subsidises, and launched the programme with non-governmental organisations on the Working Group's recommendation [Note 5]. The Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents page is not the same paragraph, and says one thing more — it traces the review to the Policy Address [Note 6].

The difference between the two pages is not decorative: the CDSP page attributes the review to "the Government", and the PDCC page attributes it to the Chief Executive's announcement in the 2022 Policy Address. The latter is the policy origin of this group of dental schemes. That page also explains that the scheme's intention is "to help adolescents build a long-term partnership with dentists in the private sector or non-governmental organisations, guiding them to maintain a lifelong habit of regular oral examination and prevent dental disease", and records that the scheme "has been launched since 20 March 2025".

In one sentence: these two schemes are two legs of one review, and by design they are "co-care" — the Government pays part and the user pays part. That explains why the PDCC subsidises only $200 with the co-payment set by the dentist, and why the CDSP has two charge tiers, category A and category B.

⚠ For an elderly person wondering "why has nobody told me what dental work my voucher covers": because the voucher was never drawn around service items in the first place. What the line is drawn around is whether that particular attendance was private primary healthcare.

#Why can the Elderly Health Care Voucher be used on dentistry? It is not a "dental scheme"

The voucher is not a dental scheme but a sum of money usable on private primary healthcare; dentists are only one of 14 registered service provider professions, which is why the voucher has no "list of designated dental services". The scheme's service provider search (apps.hcv.gov.hk, retrieved 3 August 2026) lists the healthcare professions as: medical practitioners, registered Chinese medicine practitioners, dentists, chiropractors, registered nurses and enrolled nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, radiographers, medical laboratory technologists, optometrists (Part I of the register), audiologists, dietitians, clinical psychologists and speech therapists — 14 in all, of which dentists are one.

⚠ There is something here that is very easily misread, and it is worth taking sentence by sentence. There are two places on the voucher website where dental items are listed one by one, and they carry the same list and both concern the reward's scope of use — question 41 of the FAQ for voucher users, and the "what are specified primary healthcare services?" section of the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme page. Question 41 asks "what are the restrictions on using the reward under the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme?", and one line of the answer is "dentists: dental examination, scaling, extraction, fillings and so on;".

In other words, that is a list of restrictions on the reward's use, and not the voucher's own scope of coverage. They are two documents answering two different questions: the voucher itself may be used on private primary dental services provided by a registered dentist, with the scope decided by that attendance; the reward may be used only for "specified primary healthcare purposes such as preventing disease or managing health". Taking question 41 for "the voucher may be used only on these four things" reads your own scope too narrowly.

The voucher's own boundary is drawn by several questions in the "services covered" part of the same FAQ (Health Care Voucher Division, Department of Health, June 2026). They have to be read together, because they are not independent: questions 5 and 6 set the inpatient/outpatient axis, questions 7 and 8 then divide within outpatient care, and dental patients sit exactly in the middle. The originals of the five are at [Note 7].

The four lines are: private (non-subsidised); no inpatient services; minor outpatient surgery yes; day surgical procedures no. The inpatient sentence in question 5 is the Hong Kong version of the exclusion list that appears as the third of the six rules below — the press release says the mainland scope is "the same as in Hong Kong", and questions 5 and 8 are that "same as in Hong Kong" half, which a reader can match up. Question 6 shows how officials use this line to judge an attendance: the question is not what the institution is called but whether that attendance was outpatient care without an inpatient stay.

Question 3's rider about non-governmental organisations is not idle for a dental reader either — several of Hong Kong's dental schemes (the Community Dental Support Programme, the Outreach Dental Care Programme, Hand-in-Hand Toothcare) are delivered through non-governmental organisation clinics, and question 3 explains that the private/public line is drawn not by the nature of the institution but by whether that attendance was government-subsidised; the subsidised services under those schemes are government-subsidised and so are not where the voucher applies, while self-financed services at the same non-governmental organisation clinic are another matter.

Question 7 is the half most often left out. The first word of its answer is "yes" — minor surgery within outpatient care is within the voucher's scope. The FAQ of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme puts the same line more concretely (question 6): the voucher applies to outpatient medical care services at designated departments or health service centres, including minor surgery provided by those departments (wound care, minor skin surgery and so on) [Note 8].

⚠ It has to be clear which part is the official line and which is this site's reading. What officials write is: no inpatient services, minor outpatient surgery yes, day surgical procedures no. Officials have classified no dental treatment at all — no document says extraction is "minor outpatient surgery", and none says an implant is a "day surgical procedure". The two sentences "a treatment package paid for in full up front is a medical service requiring advance payment" and "a procedure done in a day surgery theatre is a day surgical procedure" are this site's inferences from the wording, and are not the text of any page. What the official documents do give is one action you can copy, and they write it as an instruction: if in doubt, raise it with the service provider at the time of the service.

⚠ For anyone planning major dental work on a voucher: do not read "day surgical procedures do not apply" as "major dental work never applies", nor the reverse as "it certainly does". Which category an item falls into is decided by the form that attendance takes, and the only effective step is to ask the institution before paying: is this an outpatient procedure or a day surgical procedure? Is advance payment required? This line is the same in Hong Kong and on the mainland; it is not a mainland-only restriction.

#How much can be used at once? Is there a "dental cap"?

Apart from optometry services the voucher has no sub-limits at all; how much can be used on any occasion is decided by the charge for that service, and it is deducted as it is spent. Question 17's answer has two halves, and the second is the one a dental reader wants: since 2019 the voucher amount usable on optometry services has been capped at $2,000 every two years for each eligible elderly person; apart from that, there is no cap on the voucher amount used after each medical service, save that it may not exceed the cost of that service [Note 9].

That is to say: with $8,000 in the account and a dental treatment costing $8,000, the whole thing can in principle be cleared at once; but with only $2,000 in the account and a treatment costing $6,000, the voucher covers $2,000 and the rest is self-paid.

Question 18 adds a rule bearing directly on price: service providers should not charge any handling or administrative fee for the use of vouchers, and the fee charged to an elderly person using a voucher should not be higher, directly or indirectly, than the fee charged for the same service to someone not using one [Note 10].

In other words, "it costs more if you use a voucher" is contrary to the scheme's rules. When asking the price, ask about the service and its charges first, and only then say whether you will use a voucher.

A worked sum (all amounts from the official pages cited above): an elderly person already eligible before 1 January 2026 who has never used a voucher has at most $8,000 in the account on 1 January 2026. If they have a dental treatment costing $3,500 in 2026 and pay it all by voucher, $4,500 remains; a further $2,000 arrives on 1 January 2027, making $6,500, still under $8,000 and kept in full. Conversely, if they spend nothing in 2026, the total on 1 January 2027 is still capped at $8,000 — of the $2,000 newly issued, whatever exceeds the cap is not kept. Not using it is the same as losing it, which is what the accumulation cap does in practice.

⚠ For anyone who spends each January wondering whether they will need it this year: the cap applies to the account total on 1 January each year, so leaving the decision until the end of the year risks having part of it taken by the cap.

#Who gets a voucher? One clause of the eligibility rule is widely missed

Eligibility is being aged 65 or above and holding a valid Hong Kong Identity Card or a Certificate of Exemption issued by the Immigration Department; but a person whose identity card was issued by virtue of a permission to land or remain that has expired or ceased to be valid is not eligible [Note 11].

Three details are stated plainly in the official documents and are usually left out of second-hand accounts.

No need to wait for the birthday. FAQ question 9: 「長者自年滿65歲的年度起便可獲發並使用醫療券」 — someone turning 65 during 2026 has vouchers from 1 January 2026.

Non-permanent residents qualify too. FAQ question 1 states "whether or not a permanent resident". Receiving Comprehensive Social Security Assistance or a disability allowance does not affect eligibility either (question 2).

⚠ The identity card has to be "valid", and this changed in 2025. The same FAQ attaches the same note to questions 1, 11, 13 and 14: the Immigration Department has announced that all old-format smart identity cards bearing a year of birth of 1969 or earlier (that is, issued before 26 November 2018) ceased to be valid from 12 October 2025; and that a card previously issued ceases to be valid once a new card is issued for any reason [Note 12].

Putting the two together (this site's inference, with the reasoning set out here so a reader can check it): anyone turning 65 in 2026 was necessarily born in 1961 or earlier and therefore falls within the "1969 or earlier" group. Which is to say that any elderly person who has not replaced their old smart identity card has been holding an invalid card since 12 October 2025, while the voucher requires the original of a valid identity card (questions 13 and 14: Senior Citizen Cards are not accepted, and copies are not accepted). Using a voucher north of the boundary requires the same card at the institution. This is a document that stops you at the gate, not a formality.

⚠ For adult children arranging a parent's scaling or a cross-boundary follow-up: check before setting out that the card in hand is the new format, rather than finding out at the registration counter.

#The $500 reward: 2026 is the last accumulation year, but the money lasts to the end of 2027

The Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme runs for three years, with accumulation ending on 31 December 2026; this is the last year, and the reward earned for 2026 can be used until 31 December 2027 — the two dates are constantly written as one. The two sentences from the reward page are at [Note 13]: where an elderly person accumulates use of at least $1,000 of vouchers on specified primary healthcare services within the same year, the system automatically issues a $500 reward; and the scheme runs for three years to 31 December 2026, with at most one reward a year and at most $1,500 over the period.

The table on the same page separates the two timelines: the accumulation period for the 2026 reward runs from 1 January 2026 to 31 December 2026, and the period for using the reward runs from 1 January 2026 to 31 December 2027. Another sentence on the page states the rule at its strictest: the reward must be used by the end of the following year; rewards not used in time cannot be carried over and lapse.

The other rules bearing on the calculation all come from the same FAQ: paying with the reward does not count towards the accumulation for the next reward (question 42); the reward is handled separately from the annual voucher amount and does not count towards the $8,000 accumulation cap (question 43); the reward cannot be shared with a spouse (question 44), and specified primary healthcare services paid for with a spouse's vouchers accumulate to the person who received the service (question 45); and the payment order is set by the system, deducting the reward first and the voucher balance after (question 46).

⚠ Dental spending can count, but there is a gate, and it sits one line above the sentence everyone quotes. The "key points" section of the reward page says that so long as the elderly person's main reason for attendance is one of the specified primary healthcare purposes, the voucher amount used at that attendance accumulates towards the reward [Note 14]. That sentence sits directly above the $1,000/$500 sentence, and only the two together are the complete rule.

In other words, the unit of accumulation is "that attendance", and whether it counts turns on the main reason for that attendance rather than on whether the person you saw was a dentist. With the same dentist at the same clinic, a scaling and an urgent visit for toothache can count one way and the other.

Which dental items are specified purposes is given by the same set of examples on the reward page and at question 41 of the FAQ: services for "preventing disease, following up or monitoring chronic conditions" provided by "medical practitioners, Chinese medicine practitioners and dentists registered under the Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme", the dentist line's examples being "dental examination, scaling, extraction, fillings and so on". The Greater Bay Area pilot institutions are covered too: the voucher page of the Shenzhen Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital states that the reward pilot scheme applies to specified primary healthcare services provided by that hospital, such as outpatient dental care for preventing disease and following up or monitoring chronic conditions, and the pages of the Shenzhen Bauhinia Dental Clinic and the Shenzhen Zhu Shengji Dental Clinic use the same construction. The same gate appears in terms on both institutions' pages, in wording slightly different from the reward page's (the institutions' pages drop 「長者的」), with the rule the same.

There is no self-service tool for checking this gate, and the only action officials give is to ask at the time. FAQ question 49 states that an elderly person in doubt whether the medical service they are receiving meets a specified primary healthcare purpose should raise it with the service provider at the time of the service [Note 15]. The FAQ of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme (question 46) puts the same sentence as raising it with the hospital or the designated health service centre. In one sentence: finding out after leaving the clinic whether that attendance counted is already too late; the moment to ask is before paying.

A worked sum (amounts from the reward page cited above): an elderly person who accumulates $1,000 of voucher use on specified primary healthcare services during 2026 has $500 issued automatically, at most once a year, and at most $1,500 over the three years. If by 31 December 2026 they have accumulated only $900, there is no reward for 2026, and that accumulation restarts on 1 January 2027 — the page's own wording: "at the start of each year (generally 1 January) the accumulated amount is recalculated and anything accumulated before then lapses automatically". Counting from 3 August 2026, the last accumulation year has under five months left.

⚠ For an elderly person who sees a dentist once or twice a year at a few hundred dollars a time: that $1,000 threshold is "accumulated within the same year" and not "at one go", so arranging this year's remaining scaling and examination within the same year is the only thing that still works in time.

#Using vouchers north of the boundary: of the 21 service points, which 21?

The 21 service points are the 19 "pilot scheme" institutions plus the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points. That arithmetic is the Government's own: the pilot medical institutions under the "pilot scheme" have doubled to 19, and together with the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points, eligible Hong Kong elderly people may use vouchers at 21 service points in the Greater Bay Area in all, benefiting more than 1.78 million eligible Hong Kong elderly people [Note 16].

⚠ So "19 institutions with 21 points" is the wrong arithmetic. The 19 institutions have one service point each, 19 in all; the other two belong to the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital (the hospital itself and the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre). The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital is not part of the "pilot scheme"; it belongs to the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme discussed above. The Health Bureau's Legislative Council reply of 15 October 2025 sets the three side by side: the scope and principles of voucher use are broadly the same under the "pilot scheme" as in Hong Kong and under the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme. That is, officials themselves treat the "pilot scheme", Hong Kong itself and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme as three parallel arrangements — and the words used are "broadly the same", not "the same".

The nineteen institutions were brought in in two batches, and the dates themselves carry information a reader can use. The Greater Bay Area pilot scheme's background page states: on 19 February 2024 the Government announced the inclusion of seven medical institutions in the Greater Bay Area in the pilot scheme, with a note reading "apart from Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital and Bauhinia Dental Clinic, which provide dental services only, the other five medical institutions all provide comprehensive services (all of which include dental services)"; and on 2 May 2025 the Government announced 12 further institutions, "the 12 medical institutions included in the pilot scheme all provide comprehensive medical services (including dental services)" [Note 17].

That all 19 pilot institutions provide dental services is written by officials, not inferred. Those two sentences cover all 19: the first seven by the background page's note directly, and the further 12 by the background page's text directly.

The conclusion matches institution by institution against a second document. The reward pilot scheme page and question 41 of the FAQ list the designated departments of 17 of the 19 (that is, all but the two dental-only institutions) one by one, and every one of the 17 lists carries 「口腔科」 (stomatology) or 「口腔醫學中心」 (stomatology centre) — the lists vary greatly in length, from the 9 departments of the First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University and Shenzhen New Frontier United Family Hospital to the 16 of the Fifth Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University and Jiangmen Central Hospital (only the First People's Hospital of Foshan writes 「口腔醫學中心」, the other 16 writing 「口腔科」), and the stomatology entry is never once missing.

On the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital side, the hospital itself likewise has a published dental department. Question 3 of that scheme's FAQ lists the clinical centres and medical technology departments to which the voucher applies one by one, dentistry among them [Note 18]. That question answers the voucher's own scope of coverage rather than the reward's restrictions on use — precisely the two things this article warned above to keep apart, and on the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital side both lists happen to exist.

⚠ But counting stops at the last service point, and this bears on an actual journey. On the four official pages that list departments — the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme page, question 41 of the FAQ for voucher users, the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme's highlights page, and that scheme's FAQ (questions 3 and 38) — the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre is in every case a standalone entry with no department list after it: the hospital itself has 11 designated clinical centres listed one by one, and Huawei Lizhiyuan has only a line with the institution's name. The four pages are laid out consistently, so this is the convention and not one page's omission.

So this article's count is: of the 21 service points, 20 have a published dental or stomatology department; for the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre, this article does not infer on its behalf whether there is dentistry. That is not to say there is none; it is to say that no published document has said so — and going there for a tooth and finding out on arrival wastes the journey. To settle it, ask the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital directly before setting out.

⚠ Two dates are both correct, and what differs is the kind of document. The background page says the further 12 were announced on 2 May 2025; the 14 May 2025 often quoted is the day the Department of Health signed service agreements with the 12 institutions. The announcement came first and the signing after, with services beginning in batches from 26 June to 28 August 2025. On the same table, the last city (Zhaoqing) began on 28 August 2025, from which date all nine mainland cities were covered.

#Six rules that change the bill before you go north

All six are written in official documents, and every one of them changes a dental patient's plan. Except where otherwise noted, the quotations come from the Government press release of 18 August 2025.

One, eHealth is a hard prerequisite. A Hong Kong elderly person using vouchers at any Greater Bay Area service point must first register with eHealth; if they have not, the institution will register them on the spot with their consent [Note 19]. The institutions' own pages put the same rule in different words. Registration can be done on site, but that is queueing time, not a step that can be skipped.

Two, it cannot be combined with state medical insurance on the same service. The press release states that an elderly person may not use vouchers and state medical insurance to pay for the same medical service. The institutions' pages put the direction more clearly: where a service is already covered by state medical insurance, the elderly person may not use vouchers to pay for that same service.

Three, inpatient services, services requiring advance payment and day surgical procedures are all excluded. The press release: the scope of voucher use on the mainland is the same as in Hong Kong and does not include inpatient services, medical services requiring advance payment, or day surgical procedures; nor may vouchers be used simply to buy goods, drugs, medical instruments and supplies, still less be exchanged for cash [Note 20].

This rule matters most to a dental reader, because major dental items commonly take exactly these shapes. But two layers have to be kept apart. The official layer is the exclusion list itself: inpatient services, medical services requiring advance payment, day surgical procedures. This site's layer is matching common dental arrangements to them — a treatment package requiring a deposit or full payment up front appears to fall under "medical services requiring advance payment", and a procedure carried out in a day surgery theatre appears to fall under "day surgical procedures". No official document says either of those things, so they are this site's reading and not the rule. On the other half officials are explicit: question 7 of the FAQ answers "yes" to minor surgery within private outpatient care, as does question 6 of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme's FAQ. And the press release itself points out that this is not an extra mainland restriction — the scope is "the same as in Hong Kong".

Four, settlement is in renminbi, with Hong Kong dollars deducted at a monthly conversion rate. The press release states that charges at pilot medical institutions are settled in renminbi, and that institutions calculate the Hong Kong dollar amount to be deducted at the conversion rate updated monthly under the voucher scheme, displaying that month's specified rate at the payment counter [Note 21]. That is, how many Hong Kong dollars come off is set not by the day's market rate but by the scheme's specified rate for that month, posted at the payment counter. For a course of treatment spanning a month boundary, two attendances may use two different rates.

Five, you must receive the service in person. The notice bar on the voucher website's home page: eligible elderly persons may use vouchers to pay a service provider only after receiving that provider's medical service in person. Collecting medicine or settling a bill for someone else is outside the scheme.

Six, only that hospital's "designated departments", and the number differs by hospital. The press release of 18 August 2025 lists the designated departments of the five new institutions one by one: Jiangmen Central Hospital 16, Huizhou Municipal Central Hospital 10, the First People's Hospital of Zhaoqing 14, Peking University Shenzhen Hospital 14, and Shenzhen Hospital of Southern Medical University 12 — every one of those lists includes stomatology, but the number of departments runs from 10 to 16. One hospital having a department does not mean another does.

⚠ For anyone planning implants, crowns or a full-mouth reconstruction: officials have never said these items can never be paid for with vouchers, nor that they certainly can. They have only drawn a line: minor outpatient surgery is within scope, and inpatient services, day surgical procedures and services requiring advance payment are outside it. So the question to ask under rule three is not "do implants qualify" but which side this particular arrangement falls on: is a deposit or full payment required up front? Is it done in an outpatient room or a day surgery theatre? Settle that, then add rule four (renminbi, monthly conversion rate) to work out how much the voucher will cover. Note that the annual $2,000 and the $8,000 cap themselves determine that on major work the voucher can only ever be a discount and never the whole bill.

#Is "$2,000 a time" the price of dentistry in Shenzhen? How to read that 77.3%

The two Shenzhen clinics providing dental services only are 2 of the 19 pilot institutions, yet they accounted for 77.3% of all amounts claimed under the "pilot scheme"; and the averages of $1,650 and $2,122 per transaction are the voucher amounts claimed on that occasion, not the price of dental treatment. This is the most important distinction in the article.

The figures all come from table one of the annex to the sixth Legislative Council question (15 October 2025), with statistics as at 30 September 2025.

A worked sum (all from figures printed in the table above): the two dental-only clinics claimed 42,327,860 plus 944,417, that is HK$43,272,277; against the "pilot scheme" subtotal of HK$55,994,475, 43,272,277 divided by 55,994,475 is 77.3%. Their transactions came to 25,652 plus 445, that is 26,097, or 53.8% of the subtotal's 48,538. That is to say: two clinics did a little over half the transactions and used up more than three quarters of the money.

That $1,650 and $2,122 cannot be read as a price list, for three reasons. First, it is the voucher amount claimed per transaction, not the total price of treatment — an elderly person can pay the difference out of pocket, and that difference does not appear in this table. Second, the voucher gives only $2,000 a year, so the amount claimable in one transaction is itself limited by the account balance; the average of $2,122 being above $2,000 shows precisely that some elderly people were drawing on earlier years' balances or on the reward. Third, this is an average, and the distribution behind it is not published.

⚠ The people column has to be read a different way, and the direction is the opposite of the intuitive one. The "pilot scheme" subtotal of 23,336 in table one is exactly the row-by-row sum of the institutions' people figures (Shenzhen 18,178 plus Guangzhou 1,769 plus Zhongshan 1,875 plus Dongguan 588 plus Zhuhai 593 plus Foshan 184 plus Huizhou 26 plus Jiangmen 78 plus Zhaoqing 45 equals 23,336, which can be checked). And note 2 warns of exactly what such a sum does: "an elderly person may have visited more than one pilot medical institution" — someone who went to two is counted once in each row. So the actual number of elderly people who used the "pilot scheme" can only be less than or equal to 23,336, never more (the text of the same reply puts it as "more than 23 300 eligible elderly people"). Hence: Aikangjian alone was used by 15,325 elderly people, and 15,325 divided by 23,336 equals 65.7% is a lower bound rather than an exact proportion — if the denominator is inflated by double counting, the true proportion can only be higher. That is also why the total row prints "not applicable" in the people column.

A worked sum: the annual voucher of $2,000 divided by Aikangjian's average claim of $1,650 is 1.2. A whole year's vouchers is on average barely more than one transaction at that hospital. With the account accumulated to the $8,000 cap it is about 4.8. This is the ratio between the scheme's allowance and the actual scale of claims, not a prediction of how many treatments are needed.

The distribution by service category says something too. Annex table two (same document, same statistical date) divides transactions into four categories. Of Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital's 25,652 transactions, "treatment of acute conditions" accounts for only 110, or 0.43%; of Bauhinia Dental Clinic's 445, it accounts for 33, or 7.42%.

⚠ These are proportions of transactions, not of people; and the category is the official 「治理急性病症」, "treatment of acute conditions", not toothache alone. Table two has only one unit, the transaction — someone who sees a dentist several times in a year counts once each time, and no column counts people — so these two percentages cannot say how many people had such treatment, only which category accounts for what share of transactions. The category itself is one of the Government's four, in its own words, covering oral conditions needing immediate attention; officials have never written "toothache", and this article does not narrow it. Put back in table two's own unit: counted as transactions, "treatment of acute conditions" is a small minority — 0.43% at Aikangjian and 7.42% at Bauhinia — while the great majority of transactions fall under prevention (Aikangjian 23.94%), following up or monitoring chronic conditions (49.58%) and rehabilitation (26.05%).

⚠ The third note hangs on only two of the four categories, and this bears directly on the $500 reward above. Table two's column headings read, word for word, 「預防(註3)」, 「跟進／監察慢性病症(註3)」, 「治理急性病症」 and 「復康」 — only the first two carry the note 3 marker and the other two do not. And note 3 reads in full: "a category of specified primary healthcare services under the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme". In other words, it is not that all four categories count towards the reward, but that officials mark two of the four as counting. That matches the reward page's own definition: the reward's purposes are "services for preventing disease and following up or monitoring chronic conditions", two of them, with no rehabilitation and no treatment of acute conditions.

A worked sum (from Aikangjian's row in table two): transactions in the reward categories are 6,142 (prevention) plus 12,718 (following up or monitoring chronic conditions), that is 18,860, or 73.52% of that hospital's 25,652; those outside them are 110 (treatment of acute conditions) plus 6,682 (rehabilitation), that is 6,792, or 26.48%. Which is to say that more than a quarter of that hospital's voucher transactions had money deducted without advancing the $1,000 reward threshold. Table two publishes only transaction counts and not amounts, so no proportion of the money that does not count can be derived from it; this article makes no estimate.

⚠ The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital rows in tables one and two cannot be used interchangeably, and the difference in start date carries through to the total row. Table one counts from the "pilot scheme" start date (28 June 2024), giving that hospital 107,943 transactions; table two counts from the reward pilot scheme's start date (13 November 2023), giving the same hospital 141,412. The same annex, the same hospital, two totals, purely because the start dates differ, a difference of 33,469 transactions. The same 33,469 appears in both tables' total rows too: table one's total for Greater Bay Area mainland service points is 156,481 and table two's total of the same name is 189,950. Both tables' "pilot scheme" subtotals are 48,538, exactly the same — the whole difference comes from the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital row's start date. Check which table a total comes from before quoting it.

One more comparison on the same table is worth taking on its own. The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's average per transaction is only $300, yet its transaction count is 107,943 — more than twice the "pilot scheme's" whole 48,538. A service point built around general outpatient care has many transactions at a low unit value; two clinics doing dentistry only have few transactions at a high one. That shape is itself evidence that dental work is a big-ticket item, but it proves no particular price.

⚠ For anyone tempted by "dentistry up north is cheap": the official statistics this article could find say how much was claimed in vouchers, not what dentistry costs. This article has no dental price list published by any pilot institution to cite, so it will not give you a "Shenzhen dental price". And anyone planning to reach the $1,000 reward threshold through dentistry up north needs one more step: officials divide dental transactions into four categories, two of which (rehabilitation and treatment of acute conditions) carry no note 3, and at the largest clinic those two together are 26.48% of transactions — money deducted is not the same as progress accumulated.

#What if something goes wrong? Does the Dental Council of Hong Kong have jurisdiction?

All 21 service points have published complaint routes, but they are set out on two different groups of pages; and the Dental Council of Hong Kong's disciplinary jurisdiction is bounded by "practising in Hong Kong", not by "registered in Hong Kong". The latter distinction needs stating, because the two are different tests.

The Dental Council of Hong Kong's functions and members page states that the Council was established under the Dentists Registration Ordinance and that its duties include the registration of dentists practising in Hong Kong, imposing disciplinary regulation on dentists practising in Hong Kong, and the enrolment of dental hygienists in Hong Kong [Note 22]. That is, the Council's disciplinary regulation is directed at dentists practising in Hong Kong. A dentist practising on the mainland is outside it, and that is a separate question from whether they hold Hong Kong registration.

The three routes applying to the 19 pilot institutions are all set out on the Greater Bay Area pilot scheme's feedback and complaints page: the Health Care Voucher Division of the Department of Health (confined to suspected breaches of the voucher scheme's rules; telephone (+852) 2838 2311, email [email protected], fax (+852) 3582 4115, or by post to Room 901-4, 9/F, AXA Tower, 100 How Ming Street, Kwun Tong, Kowloon, Hong Kong); the institution itself (that page lists the telephone number, website and complaints email of all 19 pilot institutions, the two dental rows being Shenzhen Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital (+86) 0755-6131 1688 and Shenzhen Bauhinia Dental Clinic with Shenzhen Zhu Shengji Dental Clinic (+86) 0755-8827 0822); and the municipal health authorities of Guangdong Province (that page separately lists the complaint hotlines, websites and complaints emails of 10 localities).

The Government's own account of this structure is in the the sixth Legislative Council question reply: each medical institution has an enquiry or complaint hotline, and a Hong Kong elderly person with a complaint (including a medical incident) may raise it directly with the institution concerned or, if needed, with the provincial or municipal health authority, and the institution and the local regulator will follow it up [Note 23]. In other words: for complaints including medical incidents, the direction officials give is the institution, then the provincial or municipal health authority. That reply does not say that Hong Kong's disciplinary route applies.

⚠ The same reply does, however, evaluate the mainland route, and the evaluation is in the sentence just above. The text immediately preceding reads: "mainland medical institutions are currently subject to strict local regulation, in respect of both the quality of clinical medical services and the level of prices and charges." The same reply also contains: "since the launch of the pilot scheme in June 2024, all 19 pilot medical institutions have operated smoothly." Those two sentences are the Government's own account of how well regulation works, an official position rather than an independent third-party assessment — the reply attaches no audit result, complaint figures or case statistics to them. The sentence about prices is particularly relevant here: the Government says mainland charge levels are strictly regulated, but that statement is not itself a price list.

⚠ The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital is not in that complaints page's table of institutions, but its complaint route is published — on another group of pages. The institution contact table on the Greater Bay Area pilot complaints page lists only the 19 pilot institutions, and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital is not among them — which is the other face of its not being in the "pilot scheme". Its contact details are on the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme's own contact page: the address 1 Haiyuan First Road, Futian District, Shenzhen, Guangdong, postcode 518053; the appointment and enquiry line (86) 0755-86913333; the website www.hku-szh.org; and the emails [email protected] (complaints and feedback) and [email protected] (enquiries). The same page also gives the Health Care Voucher Division's address, the 24-hour scheme hotline (852) 2838 2311 and the email [email protected].

In one sentence: the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's complaints email is not unpublished; it is simply not on the Greater Bay Area pilot page. That hospital has the largest transaction volume of any mainland service point in the Greater Bay Area (107,943), and to find who receives a letter, the page to open is the contact page of the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme.

Incidentally, the two dental-only pilot institutions publish complaints emails as well as telephone numbers: Shenzhen Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital [email protected]; Shenzhen Bauhinia Dental Clinic and Shenzhen Zhu Shengji Dental Clinic [email protected].

⚠ For anyone choosing an institution: if "who do I go to if something goes wrong" is one of your considerations, all 21 service points have a published recipient, and the only difference is which page to open — the 19 pilot institutions take the three layers on the Greater Bay Area pilot complaints page, and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points take that scheme's own contact page, with complaints and feedback to [email protected].

#Not going north and short of money: what else is there in Hong Kong?

Besides the Elderly Health Care Voucher there are six schemes that can cover dental care, all with eligibility thresholds, and two of them are entirely free to those who qualify. The table below sets out each scheme's own published target group, dental content and cost, with the emergency dental service included for comparison.

Six points are worth taking separately.

Categories A and B are not income bands but a stated list, and they decide whether you pay $500 or $1,000. The scheme page's definitions are: category A — users of the Home Care Services for Frail Elders or Home Support Services (level one of charges or of co-payment); or persons eligible for a Hospital Authority medical fee waiver (full), including Old Age Living Allowance beneficiaries aged 75 or above; or homeless persons. Category B — participants who do not meet category A. In other words, for the same participant, whether the waiver is full or partial, and whether an Old Age Living Allowance beneficiary is 75 or above, directly changes the whole right-hand column of the table above.

The two entirely free schemes are the least known. The Outreach Dental Care Programme for the Elderly is the only government scheme in this table that lists periodontal treatment alongside scaling, and its age threshold is lower than every other elderly scheme — though that route has two halves and both must be met: aged 60 or above, and currently using a day care centre or unit for the elderly listed by the Social Welfare Department; age alone does not qualify. Hand-in-Hand Toothcare is entirely free for adults with an intellectual disability or an autism spectrum disorder, and where an applicant cannot be treated at the clinic through behavioural management, arranges treatment at a government-designated collaborating private hospital or day medical centre under conscious sedation, deep monitored anaesthesia or general anaesthesia.

CSSA and the CDSP can be used together. The CDSP FAQ, question 9: "besides joining the Community Dental Support Programme, CSSA recipients may also make good use of the dental treatment cost grant under the CSSA Scheme, which covers dental services outside the scope of subsidised services under this programme."

The CDSP's removable dentures carry two limits, and the second will make users of the older project miscount. One is fewer than twenty teeth remaining plus a dentist's assessment of difficulty eating or chewing; the other is at most twice in a lifetime, at least 5 years apart, and removable dentures received under the Community Care Fund's Elderly Dental Assistance Programme are counted too.

The CDSP's co-payment is per denture, and a set for both jaws counts as two. The charge table's note: "the co-payment is calculated per denture (that is, upper jaw or lower jaw). Fitting removable dentures for the upper and lower jaws at the same time is regarded as two dentures." So a set for both jaws is $1,000 in category A and $2,000 in category B.

Three cycle rules decide whether a quota is usable: all treatment must be completed within 180 days (FAQ question 14); unused quotas cannot be carried into the next cycle (question 17); and within one cycle subsidised services may be received only at the one non-governmental organisation dental clinic chosen (question 20). And treatment outside the subsidised scope is paid in full — the scheme page's original: "a dentist may, in their professional judgement, provide dental services outside the scope of subsidised services. This is regarded as a private arrangement between the participant and the non-governmental organisation dental clinic, and the participant must bear the full cost of those services."

#What to do next

Every item corresponds to an official document you can open for yourself; anything no document supports is not listed here.

1. Work out first which eligibility box you are in. The seven routes are in the first section above. The emergency dental service has no eligibility check but does pain relief and extraction only; the other six all require conditions to be met first.
2. Check the official lists — institutions, service points and that hospital's designated departments. Documents: the first annex to the press release of 18 August 2025 (the 21 service points) and the release's text (the designated departments of the five new institutions, one by one); the department lists for the 19 pilot institutions are separately on the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme page and at question 41 of the FAQ. The Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre has no published department list, so ask first if you are going for a tooth.
3. Register with eHealth beforehand rather than leaving it to the counter. Documents: the same press release; the institutions' own pages also state that use outside Hong Kong requires consent to join first.
4. Ask whether that particular service requires advance payment, or is a day surgical procedure. Documents: the exclusion list in the same press release, and questions 5, 7 and 8 of the voucher FAQ. This is the dividing line that decides whether the voucher can be used at all.
5. If you want to reach the $1,000 reward threshold, ask on the spot whether this attendance counts as a specified primary healthcare purpose. Documents: question 49 of the voucher FAQ; and the reward page's sentence that "so long as the elderly person's main reason for attendance is one of the specified primary healthcare purposes". Counting from 3 August 2026, the last accumulation year has under five months left.
6. Ask what the whole course costs in renminbi, and note the month's conversion rate posted at the payment counter. Document: the same press release.
7. Do not plan on stacking with state medical insurance. Documents: the same press release and the institutions' own pages.
8. Bring the original of a valid Hong Kong Identity Card. Documents: questions 13 and 14 of the voucher FAQ (Senior Citizen Cards not accepted, copies not accepted) and the note on expired old-format cards attached to questions 1, 11, 13 and 14. Anyone born in 1961 or earlier who has not replaced their old smart card is holding one that has already ceased to be valid.
9. Take your records away with the eHealth mobile application. Document: the the sixth Legislative Council question reply — the Government has rolled out the eHealth mobile application's "cross-boundary health record" and "personal folder" functions at the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital and the 19 pilot institutions. This is an official mechanism, and more solid than "remember to ask the clinic for your notes".
10. Keep the receipts and the voucher record the institution gives you. Document: the institutions' own pages — after claiming, the institution gives the elderly person a record printed with the voucher account balance. That is the evidence to attach to the routes above if you complain.
11. For how scaling itself is charged and how much the Government helps, see the article on scaling charges and subsidies.

#Frequently asked questions

How many teeth can be extracted at the emergency dental service?

One per visit. The English version of the Department of Health's page on the latest arrangements for the emergency dental service says relief of pain and tooth extraction (one tooth per visit), and the Chinese carries no such limit; but the Department's press release of 13 May 2025 states in Chinese that "compared with the current emergency dental service, which handles one tooth per visit, participants in the programme may have the number of teeth treated raised to a maximum of three teeth per visit". With several teeth giving trouble at once, that means registering again and entering the ballot again.

Can the voucher be used for implants or crowns?

Officials have classified no dental treatment at all, so there is no official yes or no to this question. The line officials draw is: minor outpatient surgery yes (FAQ question 7), inpatient services no (question 5), day surgical procedures no (question 8), and medical services requiring advance payment no (the press release of 18 August 2025). So the question to ask is not "do implants qualify" but "which side does this particular arrangement fall on" — is a deposit or full payment required up front? Is it done in an outpatient room or a day surgery theatre? Ask before paying.

Is there still time for the $500 reward this year?

Accumulation ends on 31 December 2026, and this is the last year. The threshold is at least $1,000 of vouchers used on specified primary healthcare services accumulated within the same year, not at one go. Note that the reward must be used by the end of the following year, so the $500 earned for 2026 can be used until 31 December 2027 — the accumulation period and the period of use are two different dates. Rewards not used in time cannot be carried over and lapse.

The Greater Bay Area has 21 service points — is that 19 institutions with 21 points?

No. The 21 service points are the 19 "pilot scheme" institutions (one point each) plus the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points (the hospital itself and the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre). The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital is not in the "pilot scheme"; it belongs to the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme, launched on 6 October 2015 and made permanent on 26 June 2019. That distinction appears again when looking for a complaint route: the 19 take the Greater Bay Area pilot complaints page, and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital takes that scheme's own contact page.

Do all 21 service points have dentistry?

20 have a published dental or stomatology department. All 19 pilot institutions provide dental services, which the background page states itself; and the list of designated departments at the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital itself includes dentistry. The remaining one is the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre — on all four official pages that list departments, it is a standalone entry with no department list after it. This article does not infer on its behalf whether there is dentistry; if you are going for a tooth, ask the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital before setting out.

Are the averages of $1,650 and $2,122 the price of dentistry in Shenzhen?

No. Those are the voucher amounts claimed per transaction, not the total price of treatment — an elderly person can pay the difference out of pocket, and that difference does not appear in that table. The voucher gives only $2,000 a year, so the amount claimable in one transaction is itself limited by the account balance. This article has no dental price list published by any pilot institution to cite, so it gives no "Shenzhen dental price" at all.

I receive CSSA — can I also use the Community Dental Support Programme?

Yes. The CDSP FAQ, question 9: "besides joining the Community Dental Support Programme, CSSA recipients may also make good use of the dental treatment cost grant under the CSSA Scheme, which covers dental services outside the scope of subsidised services under this programme."

#Notes: the official wording

Every source in this section publishes in Chinese, and where a sentence is quoted the rendering is ours and is marked as such, with the original set out alongside so it can be checked.

[Note 1] The Department of Health, latest arrangements for the emergency dental service. The rendering is ours:

The emergency services provided by the emergency dental service include pain relief or tooth extraction, but do not include fillings, scaling, dentures, bridge removal and the like; extraction before orthodontic treatment is also outside the scope of the service. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

牙科街症提供的緊急服務包括止痛或脫牙，但不包括 補牙、洗牙、鑲牙、拆除牙橋 等服務，此外箍牙前的脫牙也不在服務範圍內。

The same paragraph in the English version reads relief of pain and tooth extraction (one tooth per visit).

[Note 2] The Department of Health's press release of 13 May 2025. The rendering is ours:

Compared with the current emergency dental service, which handles one tooth per visit, participants in the programme may have the number of teeth treated raised to a maximum of three teeth per visit. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

對比現時的牙科街症服務每次處理一顆牙齒，計劃下的參加者可獲治療的牙齒數目增加至每次最多三顆牙齒。

[Note 3] The same page as [Note 1]. The renderings are ours:

The emergency dental service online registration system (the registration system) came into service on 30 December 2024. On the same day the "preliminary registration" arrangement for the emergency dental service ceased, and members of the public no longer need to queue at the dental clinics concerned for a ticket. Online registration for the ballot runs from 6 in the morning to half past 11 in the morning, so as to make it convenient for members of the public in need of emergency dental services to register. Where the following day is a Saturday or public holiday, the registration system will not accept registrations. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

牙科街症網上登記系統（登記系統）已於二零二四年十二月三十日投入服務。同日，牙科街症服務的「初步登記」安排已停止，市民無須再前往有關牙科診所排隊取籌。網上登記抽籤時間，由早上六時至上午十一時三十分，以便利有需要獲取緊急牙科服務的市民登記。如翌日為星期六或公眾假期，登記系統將不接受登記。

To take particular care of elderly people in need, half the places are reserved for a priority ballot for those aged 65 or above; elderly people who do not obtain a priority ticket in the first round are then allocated the remaining places by automatic computer ballot along with everyone else who has registered. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

為了特別照顧有需要的長者，一半的名額會預留給65歲或以上的長者優先抽籤，而第一輪未獲分配優先籌的長者，亦會與其他已登記的人士一同以電腦自動抽籤方式分配餘下名額。

The registration system has a compassionate mechanism to take care of people who have registered repeatedly without obtaining a place at the emergency dental service. Under this mechanism the Department of Health sets aside 5 per cent of first-round ballot places for people who have registered repeatedly for the emergency dental service in the past 30 days without successfully obtaining one. The system will also give such people priority on the waiting list. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

登記系統設有體恤機制，以照顧部分多次登記仍未能獲發牙科街症服務名額的人士。跟據此機制，衞生署劃出百分之五的首輪抽籤名額，分配予過去30日內多次登記牙科街症但未能成功獲發服務名額的人士。此外，系統亦會優先將這類人士安排在候補名單中。

[Note 4] The Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme's background page and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme's background page. The renderings are ours:

To give Hong Kong elderly people one more service point at which to use vouchers, and to make it convenient for Hong Kong elderly people living on the mainland to obtain the medical services they need in Shenzhen, the Government launched a pilot scheme on 6 October 2015 allowing eligible Hong Kong elderly people to use vouchers to pay for outpatient medical care services provided by designated departments of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

為提供予香港長者多一個使用醫療券的服務點，以及可以方便在內地定居的香港長者在深圳獲得所需的醫療服務，政府於2015年10月6日推出試點計劃，讓合資格的香港長者可以使用醫療券支付香港大學深圳醫院指定科室提供的門診醫療護理服務的費用。

The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region launched a pilot scheme on 6 October 2015 allowing eligible Hong Kong elderly people to use vouchers to pay for outpatient medical care services provided by designated departments of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital. From 26 June 2019 the Government made the pilot scheme permanent. From 17 April 2023 the scope of the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme extended to that hospital's external Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

香港特別行政區政府於2015年10月6日推出試點計劃，讓合資格的香港長者可以使用醫療券支付香港大學深圳醫院指定科室提供的門診醫療護理服務的費用。由2019年6月26日起，政府已將試點計劃恆常化。由2023年4月17日起，長者醫療券香港大學深圳醫院計劃的使用範圍擴展至該院外設的華為荔枝苑社區健康服務中心。

[Note 5] The Community Dental Support Programme introduction page. The rendering is ours:

In response to growing public demand for public dental services, the Government set up the Working Group on Oral Health and Dental Care at the end of 2022 to review comprehensively the dental services provided or subsidised by the Government. On the Working Group's recommendation, the Government launched the "Community Dental Support Programme" in collaboration with non-governmental organisations. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

因應市民大眾對公營牙科服務需求日見殷切，政府於2022年底成立口腔健康及牙科護理工作小組，全面檢視政府提供或資助的牙科服務。應工作小組的建議，政府與非政府組織合作推出「社區牙科支援計劃」。

[Note 6] The Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents introduction page. The rendering is ours:

In response to growing public demand for public dental services, the Chief Executive announced in the 2022 Policy Address a comprehensive review of the dental services provided or subsidised by the Government, and set up the Working Group on Oral Health and Dental Care at the end of 2022. On the Working Group's recommendation, the Government launched the "Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents". (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

因應市民大眾對公營牙科服務需求日見殷切，行政長官在 2022 年《施政報告》中，宣布全面檢視政府提供或資助的牙科服務，並在 2022 年年底成立口腔健康及牙科護理工作小組。應工作小組的建議，政府推出「青少年護齒共同治理先導計劃」。

[Note 7] The "services covered" part of the FAQ for voucher users (Health Care Voucher Division, Department of Health, June 2026). The renderings are ours:

Question 3:

Can vouchers be used for medical services provided by charitable bodies, non-profit organisations or other non-governmental organisations? Answer: vouchers may be used on private (non-subsidised) healthcare services. On the principle of avoiding double government subsidy, and unless otherwise specified, vouchers may not be used on public services or services directly subsidised by the Government (including publicly funded services purchased from the private market). So long as that principle is met, vouchers may be used on medical services provided by charitable bodies, non-profit organisations or other non-governmental organisations. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券可否用於慈善團體、非牟利機構或其他非政府組織提供的醫療服務？ 答： 醫療券可用於私營(非資助)醫護服務。基於避免政府雙重補貼的原則，除特別註明外，醫療券不可以用於公營服務或政府直接資助的服務（包括向私營市場購買的公共資助服務）。只要符合此原則，醫療券可用於慈善團體、非牟利機構或其他非政府組織所提供的醫療服務。

Question 5, on inpatient services:

No. The Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme is intended to strengthen primary healthcare services for the elderly, and vouchers do not apply to inpatient services. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

不可以。長者醫療券計劃旨在加強對長者的基層醫療服務，醫療券並不適用於住院服務。

Question 6:

Can vouchers be used for accident and emergency services at private hospitals? Answer: yes. Where that accident and emergency service is outpatient care not involving an inpatient stay, vouchers may in principle be used to pay for it. Since the Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme is intended to strengthen primary healthcare services for the elderly, we hope service providers will advise them to use vouchers more on primary healthcare services. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券可否用於私家醫院的急症室服務？ 答： 可以。若此急症室服務是門診，不涉及住院服務，原則上是可以使用醫療券支付服務費用。由於長者醫療券計劃旨在加強對長者的基層醫療服務，我們希望醫療服務提供者建議他們將醫療券多用於基層醫療服務上。

Question 7:

Can vouchers be used for minor surgery within private outpatient care? Answer: yes. Vouchers may be used on preventive and therapeutic services, but not merely to buy goods such as drugs, spectacles, dried seafood, personal care products, food or medical supplies. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券可否用於私營門診內的小手術？ 答： 可以。醫療券可用於預防性及治療性的服務，但不可用來純粹購買物品，如藥物、眼鏡、海味、個人護理用品、食品或醫療用品。

Question 8:

Can vouchers be used for day surgical procedures, such as cataract surgery or endoscopy services? Answer: no. The Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme is intended to strengthen primary healthcare services for the elderly, and does not apply to day surgical procedures. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券可否用於日間手術程序，例如白內障手術或内窺鏡檢查服務？ 答： 不可以。長者醫療券計劃旨在為加強對長者的基層醫療服務，並不適用於日間手術程序。

[Note 8] Question 6 of the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme's FAQ. The rendering is ours:

Do vouchers apply to minor surgery within the outpatient medical care services of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital? Answer: yes. Vouchers apply to outpatient medical care services at the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's designated departments and designated health service centres, including minor surgery provided by those departments and health service centres (wound care, minor skin surgery and so on). (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券是否適用於香港大學深圳醫院的門診醫療護理服務內的小手術？ 答： 可以。醫療券適用於香港大學深圳醫院指定科室／指定的健康服務中心的門診醫療護理服務，包括由這些科室／健康服務中心提供的小手術（如傷口護理、皮膚小手術等）。

[Note 9] Question 17 of the FAQ for voucher users. The renderings are ours:

Since 2019 the voucher amount usable on optometry services by each eligible elderly person has been capped at 2,000 dollars every two years (the "quota"). (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

由2019年起，每名合資格長者可用於視光服務的醫療券金額上限為每兩年2,000元（下稱「配額」）。

Apart from the above, there is no cap on the voucher amount used after each medical service, save that it may not exceed the cost of the medical service received on that occasion. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

除上述以外，每次接受醫療服務後使用的醫療券金額不設上限，但不得超過該次所獲醫療服務的費用。

[Note 10] The same, question 18. The rendering is ours:

Service providers should not charge any handling or administrative fee for an elderly person's use of vouchers. The fee charged to an elderly person using vouchers should not be higher, whether directly or indirectly, than that charged to a person not using vouchers for the same medical service. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療服務提供者不應就長者使用醫療券收取任何手續費或行政費。長者使用醫療券時被收取的費用不應高於（不論直接還是間接）沒有使用醫療券人士就接受同等醫療服務而被收取的費用。

[Note 11] The Elderly Health Care Voucher page on eligible elderly persons and the annual voucher amount. The rendering is ours:

An elderly person aged 65 or above holding a valid Hong Kong Identity Card or a Certificate of Exemption issued by the Immigration Department is eligible to be granted and to use vouchers to pay for private primary healthcare services, save where that elderly person was issued a Hong Kong Identity Card by virtue of a permission to land or remain that has since expired or ceased to be valid. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

年滿65歲並持有有效香港身份證或入境事務處發出的《豁免登記證明書》的長者，即符合資格領取及使用醫療券支付私營基層醫療服務的費用，但若該長者是憑藉其已獲入境或逗留准許而獲簽發香港身份證，而該准許已經逾期或不再有效則除外。

[Note 12] The note attached to questions 1, 11, 13 and 14 of the FAQ for voucher users. The rendering is ours:

The Immigration Department has announced that all old-format smart identity cards bearing a year of birth of 1969 or earlier (that is, issued before 26 November 2018) ceased to be valid from 12 October 2025. Furthermore, where a new identity card is issued for any reason, the card previously issued ceases to be valid. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

入境事務處已公布所有載有出生年份為1969年或之前的舊款智能身份證（即在2018年11月26日前發出），由2025年10月12日起失效。此外，不論任何原因獲發新身份證後，之前獲發的身份證即告失效。

[Note 13] The Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme page. The renderings are ours:

Where an elderly person accumulates use of at least 1,000 dollars of vouchers on specified primary healthcare services within the same year, the eHealth (Subsidies) system automatically issues a 500 dollar reward to their voucher account. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

長者在同一年度累計使用至少1,000元醫療券於特定基層醫療服務，醫健通（資助）系統即會自動發放500元獎賞至其醫療券戶口。

The Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme (the "reward pilot scheme") runs for three years, to 31 December 2026, with an elderly person able to obtain at most one reward a year, that is at most 1,500 dollars of rewards over the period of the reward pilot scheme. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

長者醫療券獎賞先導計劃（「獎賞先導計劃」）為期三年，至2026年12月31日止，長者每年度最多可獲取獎賞一次，即在「獎賞先導計劃」期間最多可獲取1,500元獎賞。

The reward must be used by the end of the following year. Rewards not used in time cannot be accumulated and lapse. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

獎賞的使用期限為下一個年度的年底。未及使用的獎賞不能累積，逾期作廢。

At the start of each year (generally 1 January) the accumulated amount is recalculated, and anything accumulated before then lapses automatically. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

在每一個年度起始時（一般為1月1日），累積金額會重新計算，此前累積的自動作廢。

[Note 14] The same, the "key points" section. The rendering is ours:

So long as the elderly person's main reason for attendance is one of the specified primary healthcare purposes, the voucher amount used by the elderly person at that service accumulates towards earning a reward, for later use in paying for such specified primary healthcare services. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

只要長者的主要到診原因屬指明的特定基層醫療用途，長者在該次服務所使用的醫療券金額便可累積計算以賺取獎賞，供日後用作支付該等特定基層醫療服務費用。

[Note 15] Question 49 of the FAQ for voucher users. The rendering is ours:

What can an elderly person do if in doubt whether the medical service received meets a specified primary healthcare purpose? Answer: an elderly person in doubt whether the medical service being received meets a specified primary healthcare purpose should raise it with the service provider at the time of the service. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

長者如對所接受的醫療服務是否符合特定基層醫療用途有疑問，可如何處理？ 答： 長者如對接受的醫療服務是否符合特定基層醫療用途有疑問，應在接受醫療服務時向醫療服務提供者提出。

[Note 16] The Government press release of 18 August 2025. The rendering is ours:

The pilot medical institutions under the "pilot scheme" have doubled to 19; together with the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points, eligible Hong Kong elderly people may use vouchers at 21 service points in the Greater Bay Area in all (details in the first annex) to pay for outpatient medical care services at designated departments, benefiting more than 1.78 million eligible Hong Kong elderly people. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

「試點計劃」下的試點醫療機構倍增至19間，連同香港大學深圳醫院的一院兩點，合資格香港長者可在大灣區內合共21個服務點（資料見附件一）使用醫療券支付指定科室的門診醫療護理服務費用，讓超過178萬名合資格的香港長者受惠。

[Note 17] The Greater Bay Area pilot scheme's background page. The renderings are ours:

On 19 February 2024 the Government announced the inclusion of seven medical institutions in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (the Greater Bay Area) in the "Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme" (the "pilot scheme"). (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

2024年2月19日，政府公布把七間位於粵港澳大灣區（大灣區）的醫療機構納入「長者醫療券大灣區試點計劃」（「試點計劃」）

Note: apart from Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital and Bauhinia Dental Clinic, which provide dental services only, the other five medical institutions all provide comprehensive services (all of which include dental services). (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

註： 除愛康健口腔醫院和紫荊口腔門診只提供牙科服務，其餘五間醫療機構均提供綜合服務（全部均有提供牙科服務）。

On 2 May 2025 the Government announced the addition of 12 medical institutions under the "pilot scheme". The 12 medical institutions included in the "pilot scheme" all provide comprehensive medical services (including dental services). (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

政府於2025年5月2日公布於「試點計劃」下新增12間醫療機構。獲納入「試點計劃」的12間醫療機構均提供綜合醫療服務（包括牙科服務）。

[Note 18] Question 3 of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme's FAQ. The rendering is ours:

Vouchers apply to outpatient medical care services, including preventive care services and therapeutic and rehabilitative services, at the following clinical centres and medical technology departments of the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital and at designated health service centres under it: clinical centres — family medicine general outpatient clinic, health check centre, emergency department, orthopaedics, ophthalmology, dentistry, Chinese medicine, internal medicine, gynaecology, surgery and rehabilitation outpatient clinic; medical technology departments — physiotherapy, medical imaging, clinical microbiology and infection control, and pathology; and the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券適用於下列香港大學深圳醫院的診療中心／醫技科室，以及香港大學深圳醫院屬下指定的健康服務中心的門診醫療護理服務，包括預防性護理服務，以及治療和復康性服務：診療中心－家庭醫學全科門診、體檢中心、急診科、骨科、眼科、牙科、中醫科、內科、婦科、外科、康復科門診；醫技科室－物理治療科、醫學影像科、臨床微生物及感染控制科、病理科；及華為荔枝苑社區健康服務中心。

[Note 19] The Government press release of 18 August 2025. The rendering is ours:

A Hong Kong elderly person using vouchers at any Greater Bay Area service point must first register with eHealth. … Where an elderly person wishes to use vouchers at a designated medical institution in the Greater Bay Area but has not joined eHealth, the medical institution will, with the elderly person's consent, register them with eHealth on the spot so that they can use vouchers straight away. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

香港長者在任何一個大灣區服務點使用醫療券，均須先登記加入醫健通。……如長者欲於大灣區的指定醫療機構使用醫療券，但尚未加入醫健通，醫療機構在取得長者同意後，會即時為長者登記醫健通，以便長者可隨即使用醫療券。

[Note 20] The same. The rendering is ours:

The scope of voucher use on the mainland is the same as in Hong Kong, and does not include inpatient services, medical services requiring advance payment, or day surgical procedures. Nor may vouchers be used merely to buy goods, drugs, medical instruments and supplies, still less be exchanged for cash. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

在內地使用醫療券的適用範圍跟在香港一樣，不包括住院服務、須預先繳費的醫療服務及日間手術程序。醫療券亦不可用於單純購買物品、藥物、醫療儀器和用品，更不可兌換現金。

[Note 21] The same. The rendering is ours:

Charges for medical services at pilot medical institutions are all settled in renminbi. The medical institution declares the elderly person's use of vouchers and calculates the Hong Kong dollar voucher amount to be deducted at the conversion rate updated monthly under the voucher scheme. The medical institution displays the scheme's specified monthly conversion rate at the payment counter for the elderly person's reference. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

試點醫療機構的醫療服務收費均以人民幣結算。醫療機構會為長者申報使用醫療券，並按醫療券計劃下每月更新的換算率計算需扣除的港元醫療券金額。醫療機構會於收費處標示計劃下每月的指明換算率，供長者參考。

[Note 22] The Dental Council of Hong Kong's functions and members page. The rendering is ours:

The Dental Council of Hong Kong is established under the Dentists Registration Ordinance, and its duties include handling the registration (including specialist registration) of dentists practising in Hong Kong, imposing disciplinary regulation on dentists practising in Hong Kong, and handling the enrolment of dental hygienists in Hong Kong. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

香港牙醫管理委員會是根據《牙醫註冊條例》成立，職責包括處理香港執業的牙醫的註冊（包括專科註冊）、對在香港執業的牙醫施加紀律規管以及處理香港牙齒衞生員的登記。

[Note 23] the sixth Legislative Council question, 15 October 2025. The renderings are ours:

Each medical institution under the "pilot scheme" has an enquiry or complaint hotline. A Hong Kong elderly person with a complaint about a pilot medical institution, including a medical incident, may raise it directly with the medical institution concerned through various channels (including telephone or email), or where needed complain to the provincial or municipal health authority about a medical institution under the "pilot scheme", and the medical institution and the local regulator will follow it up. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

「試點計劃」下每間醫療機構均設有查詢或投訴熱線，香港長者如就試點醫療機構有投訴，包括醫療事故，可按不同的渠道（包括電話或電郵）向相關醫療機構直接提出，或在有需要時向省或市級衞生當局就「試點計劃」下醫療機構作出投訴，有關的醫療機構及當地監管機構會跟進處理。

The same reply also contains three further sentences. The renderings are ours:

Mainland medical institutions are currently subject to strict local regulation, in respect of both the quality of clinical medical services and the level of prices and charges. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

現時內地醫療機構受當地嚴格監管，不論是臨床醫療服務質素，以至價格收費水平都有嚴格監管。

Since the launch of the "pilot scheme" in June 2024, all 19 pilot medical institutions have operated smoothly. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

自二○二四年六月推行「試點計劃」至今，19間試點醫療機構均運作暢順。

The scope and principles of voucher use are broadly the same under the "pilot scheme" as in Hong Kong and under the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme. (our translation from the Chinese original)

Chinese original:

醫療券的適用範圍和使用原則在「試點計劃」與香港和港大深圳醫院計劃大致相同。

#What this article does not state

• Prices for dental treatment on the mainland. This article has no dental price list published by any mainland institution. The voucher website's pages for the two dental-only pilot institutions give only address, telephone number and the process for using vouchers, with no prices for treatment items; the Shenzhen Bauhinia Dental Clinic and Shenzhen Zhu Shengji Dental Clinic's own website (dentalbauhinia.com, 3 August 2026) has only introduction, team, contact and booking pages, likewise with no price page. The Shenzhen Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital's own website (ckjhk.com, the address being on that hospital's voucher institution page) restricts external access, so this article states nothing at all about whether that hospital publishes prices — neither that it does nor that it does not. This article does not cite figures circulating informally, and instead cites the Government's published average amount claimed per transaction, marking it as not being a price.
• Whether insurance covers dental care outside Hong Kong. This article has no source to cite and therefore states nothing. Readers should check directly with the policy issuer.
• The number of follow-up visits. No source cited here says how many trips a cross-boundary course of dental treatment takes, and this article makes no estimate.
• Which departments the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre has. On the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme's highlights page, at questions 3 and 38 of its FAQ, and on the Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme page, that centre appears as a single entry with no department list after it (while the hospital itself has 11 clinical centres listed one by one). This article therefore states nothing about whether that centre has dentistry. (The hospital's own departments for voucher use are stated in terms — see above, question 3 lists them one by one, dentistry included.)
• The practical effect of mainland dental charges being "strictly regulated". The Government made that statement in its Legislative Council reply of 15 October 2025, which this article quotes and marks as an official position; the reply attaches no prices, audit or case figures, and this article has no other source to confirm or contradict it, so it offers no assessment.
• The maximum amount for each item under the CSSA dental treatment cost grant. The current version of the Social Welfare Department's Comprehensive Social Security Assistance Scheme Guide (online version) (April 2026) lists no amounts; the same table does list amounts for spectacles and for the annual body check for elderly people in residential care. This article does not speculate about why the entry is blank.
• The duration of each scheme. Apart from those the issuing body states in terms (Hand-in-Hand Toothcare to the end of March 2027; the reward pilot scheme "runs for three years, to 31 December 2026"; PDS2's service period extended to 28 February 2027), this article gives no duration or end date for any scheme. The pages for the Community Dental Support Programme, the Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents, the Outreach Dental Care Programme for the Elderly and the Elderly Health Care Voucher state no duration, and show no page revision date either.
• Any comparison of institutions or dentists. This article makes none.

Status of the material: official scheme rules, Government press releases and Legislative Council papers, with every figure attributed to its source and statistical date next to it. The reward pilot scheme's accumulation period ends on 31 December 2026, and the relevant parts of this article should be reviewed around that date.

#Sources

• Elderly Health Care Voucher eligibility, the annual $2,000 and the $8,000 accumulation cap, and the table of amounts over time: Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme, eligible elderly persons and annual voucher amount, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcvs/service_area.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The voucher's scope (not applicable to public or government-subsidised services, not applicable to inpatient services (question 5), private hospital accident and emergency outpatient services yes (question 6), not applicable to day surgical procedures, not for merely buying goods), no cap on the amount used each time (apart from optometry services), no handling or administrative fee, no need to wait for the 65th birthday, non-permanent residents and CSSA recipients equally eligible, the original of a valid identity card required, old-format smart identity cards invalid from 12 October 2025, minor outpatient surgery yes (question 7), the reward rules at questions 39 to 46, the designated departments of the 19 pilot institutions one by one (question 41), and raising doubts about purpose on the spot (question 49): Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme, FAQ for voucher users, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/faqs/faqs_vr.html (the page footer stating "Health Care Voucher Division, Department of Health, June 2026"), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme running for three years to 31 December 2026, at most one reward a year, at most $1,500 over three years, the 2026 accumulation period and period of use, the accumulation condition "so long as the elderly person's main reason for attendance is one of the specified primary healthcare purposes", and the list of specified primary healthcare services (including the dentist examples, the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's 11 designated clinical centres, and the designated departments of 17 of the 19 pilot institutions one by one): Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme, Elderly Health Care Voucher Reward Pilot Scheme, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/use_of_vouchers/pilot_reward_scheme.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The voucher scheme's history (the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital pilot launched 6 October 2015 and why, the eligible age falling from 70 to 65 on 1 July 2017, the optometry cap of 26 June 2019, the extension to the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre on 17 April 2023, four new professions on 28 April 2023, spouse sharing on 28 July 2023, and the reward pilot scheme launched on 13 November 2023): Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme, background, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcvs/background.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• Dentists as one of 14 registered healthcare professions: Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme service provider search, https://apps.hcv.gov.hk/Public/tc/SPS/Search (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The requirement to receive the service in person: the notice bar on the Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme home page, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/index.html, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• Seven institutions brought into the pilot scheme (announced 19 February 2024), the two providing dental services only and the other five all providing dental services, the further 12 (announced 2 May 2025), and each institution's service start date: Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme, background, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcv_gba_pilot_scheme/background.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The Department of Health signing service agreements with the 12 newly included institutions on 14 May 2025: Government press release, "DH signs service agreements with medical institutions newly included in Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme (with photos)", https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202505/14/P2025051400503.htm, 14 May 2025, retrieved 10 August 2026.
• The attendance process at the two dental-only pilot institutions, the eHealth prerequisite, the bar on stacking with state medical insurance, the reward's scope, and addresses and enquiry telephone numbers: Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme, Shenzhen Aikangjian Stomatological Hospital https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcv_gba_pilot_scheme/szckjsh.html and Shenzhen Bauhinia Dental Clinic / Shenzhen Zhu Shengji Dental Clinic https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcv_gba_pilot_scheme/dbssc_dbgcc.html (neither page showing a revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The 19 pilot institutions plus the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's one hospital, two points making 21 service points, the dates of full coverage of the nine cities, the designated departments of the five new institutions, renminbi settlement and the monthly conversion rate, the eHealth registration requirement, the exclusions for inpatient services, advance payment and day surgical procedures, and the complaint hotlines: Government press release, "Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme covers all nine mainland cities of the Greater Bay Area", https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202508/18/P2025081800799.htm, 18 August 2025, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The list of 21 service points (a single bilingual document): the first annex to the same release, https://gia.info.gov.hk/general/202508/18/P2025081800799_507012_1_1755515099786.pdf, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The scheme's expenditure and number of users, why the two designated dental clinics in Shenzhen were set up, the complaints structure (including medical incidents), the Government's statements on mainland regulation and on the pilot's operation, the three-way comparison of the "pilot scheme", Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital scheme, and the rollout of the eHealth mobile application's "cross-boundary health record" and "personal folder" functions at the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital and the 19 pilot institutions: the sixth Legislative Council question, "Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme", https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202510/15/P2025101500688.htm, 15 October 2025, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• Each pilot institution's claim transactions, amounts, averages per transaction and number of elderly users (as at 30 September 2025), the distribution by service category, and each table's own notes (table one notes 1 and 2; table two notes 1, 2 and 3, note 3 hanging only on the "prevention" and "following up or monitoring chronic conditions" columns): annex tables one and two to the same reply, https://gia.info.gov.hk/general/202510/15/P2025101500688_515918_1_1760527828907.pdf, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The three complaint routes applying to the 19 pilot institutions, the contact table for the 19 (including the telephone numbers and complaints emails of the two dental institutions), and the contact table for 10 Guangdong provincial localities: Elderly Health Care Voucher Greater Bay Area Pilot Scheme, feedback and complaints, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/hcv_gba_pilot_scheme/feedback_and_complaint.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The name of the Elderly Health Care Voucher University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital Scheme, its launch on 6 October 2015, its becoming permanent on 26 June 2019, and its extension to the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre on 17 April 2023: that scheme's background page, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/shenzhen/background.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• That scheme's list of designated departments and health service centres where vouchers may be used (11 clinical centres, 4 medical technology departments and the Huawei Lizhiyuan Community Health Service Centre), the reward pilot scheme's scope at that hospital, and the renminbi conversion rate mechanism: that scheme's highlights page, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/shenzhen/highlights.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• That scheme's question 3 (departments where vouchers apply), question 6 (minor outpatient surgery yes), question 7 (day surgical procedures no), question 38 (where the reward applies) and question 46 (raising doubts about purpose on the spot): that scheme's FAQ, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/shenzhen/faqs.html (the page footer stating "Department of Health, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, June 2026"), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• That scheme's publications page (carrying only the scheme leaflet, with no department list): https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/shenzhen/publications.html, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital's address, appointment and enquiry line, complaints and feedback email [email protected] and enquiry email [email protected], and the Health Care Voucher Division's contact details: that scheme's contact page, https://www.hcv.gov.hk/tc/shenzhen/contact.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The scope of the Dental Council of Hong Kong's duties (dentists practising in Hong Kong): Dental Council of Hong Kong, functions and members, https://www.dchk.org.hk/tc/about_us/functions_members_dchk.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The scope of the emergency dental service, the 11 clinics, the ballot arrangements (online registration from 30 December 2024, the registration hours, half the places for those aged 65 or above, the 5% compassionate places), and the charges and definition of eligible persons from 1 January 2026: Department of Health, emergency dental service — latest arrangements, https://www.dh.gov.hk/tc_chi/main/main_ds/main_ds_public.html (the page stating itself 30 July 2026), retrieved 3 August 2026; the clinic list page titled "emergency dental service clinics (pain relief and extraction only)": https://www.dh.gov.hk/tc_chi/tele/tele_chc/tele_chc_dcgps.html (the page stating itself the first of May 2025), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The Community Dental Support Programme's background (the Working Group on Oral Health and Dental Care set up at the end of 2022), target group, scope of subsidised services, administrative fee and co-payments, the definitions of categories A and B, and services outside the subsidised scope being paid in full: Department of Health, Community Dental Support Programme — introduction, https://www.communitydental.gov.hk/tc/cdsp/introduction_of_cdsp.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026; CSSA used together with the programme (question 9), all treatment completed within 180 days (question 14), quotas not carried into the next cycle (question 17), and services within one cycle only at the one clinic chosen (question 20): the same programme's FAQ, https://www.communitydental.gov.hk/tc/cdsp/public/faq.html, retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The emergency dental service "handling one tooth per visit" (stated in terms in Chinese) and the Community Dental Support Programme's launch date: Government press release announcing that the Community Dental Support Programme would be launched on 26 May, https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202505/13/P2025051300358.htm, 13 May 2025, retrieved 3 August 2026. The English version of the emergency dental service page for "one tooth per visit" and the on-site registration assistance arrangement: https://www.dh.gov.hk/english/main/main_ds/main_ds_public.html (the page stating itself 30 Jul 2026), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The name of the Pilot Dental Service (Scaling) for Civil Servants and Eligible Persons, phase two, how invitations are issued, one scaling only, the 12-month interval, the appointment and completion deadlines, and the service period to 28 February 2027: Department of Health, dental services, Chinese https://www.dh.gov.hk/tc_chi/main/main_ds/main_psds.html and English https://www.dh.gov.hk/english/main/main_ds/main_psds.html (the page stating itself 28 July 2026), retrieved 3 August 2026. The scheme name is taken from the Chinese version; the terms are taken from the English version and restated here rather than quoted.
• The Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents' background and intention, target group, scope of subsidised services, the $200 subsidy and recommended co-payment, and its launch on 20 March 2025: Department of Health, Pilot Dental Co-Care Scheme for Adolescents — introduction, https://www.communitydental.gov.hk/tc/pdcc/introduction_of_pdcc.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The Outreach Dental Care Programme for the Elderly's target group (including day care centre users aged 60 or above), treatment items (including periodontal treatment) and being free: Department of Health, Outreach Dental Care Programme for the Elderly — introduction, https://www.communitydental.gov.hk/tc/odcp/introduction_of_odcp.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• Hand-in-Hand Toothcare's target group, scope of services, being free, and its extension to the end of March 2027: Department of Health, Hand-in-Hand Toothcare — introduction, https://www.communitydental.gov.hk/tc/htc/introduction_of_htc.html (the page showing no revision date), retrieved 3 August 2026.
• The items covered by the CSSA dental treatment cost grant (including scaling), the quotation mechanism, the option of having the same treatment provided by any registered dentist in Hong Kong, and the maximum amounts for other items in the same table (spectacles $665, annual body check for elderly people in residential care $200): Social Welfare Department, Comprehensive Social Security Assistance Scheme Guide (online version) (April 2026), https://www.swd.gov.hk/storage/asset/section/179/tc/CSSAG042026(Chi).pdf, section (c) "medical and rehabilitation grants", retrieved 3 August 2026.

This article was compiled by the editorial team from official and academic sources, with every clinical statement attributed; it is health information and not medical advice.