At a bustling Beijing hospital, Tian Yigui hands over some of his elderly wife's paperwork to Meng Jia, a "patient companion" hired to help navigate China's stretched and bureaucratic healthcare system.

Yawning funding gaps and patchy medical coverage have long funnelled many Chinese people towards better resourced city hospitals for much-needed care.

Sprawling, overcrowded and noisy, the facilities can be exhausting for patients and their families, especially the elderly.

The problem has fuelled the rise of patient companions, or "peizhenshi", a lucrative and unofficial service in the country's growing gig economy.

Tian, 83, said most Beijing hospitals were "overwhelmingly confusing".

"We have to go up and down all the floors, wait for elevators, wait in lines... it's really troublesome," he told AFP.

Elsewhere at the People's Liberation Army General Hospital in the Chinese capital, patients faced long queues, myriad check-ins and a whirl of digital payment codes.

Hospital aides wearing bright red sashes rattled off directions into headsets as hundreds of patients filed through the colossal........

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