• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.20 no.3
• /
• pp.211-233
• /
• 2019

The 「Health Care Workforce Support Act」 was came into effect on 29 October 2019. Health care workforce is the most important national health resource, and the quantity and quality of them is also related to the level of national health care. This study examined the background and major contents of this Act and suggested future improvement by analyzing main issues. Th e Act was enacted to support the health care workforce for their recruitment and better working environment. By stipulating the establishment of the master plan, management of the supply and demand, improvement of working environment for health care workforce, the act contributed to raise the quality of health service and health promotion. Given that the act was developed in consideration to support of health care workers, it has many meanings. However, it is necessary to reexamine the above-mentioned five issues in order to develop the effective law while utilizing the significance of the law for health care workforce support and has to revise as soon as possible.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.20 no.3
• /
• pp.3-45
• /
• 2019

Health insurance is the main instrument to protect the people against sickness. To examine the task of in the future it would be necessary to extract and understand the components formed in its formation and development, benefit related and normative characteristics of the health insurance itself. The health insurance oriented itself to the universal coverage at a law level. Paradoxically this worked positively for the universal development of the health insurance. The task of the health insurance is on the one hand universal, positive and open. On the other hand it has to shape type of allowed method, art and content of the medical treatments into the regulation to ensure the equal benefit as well as the financial stability. That is, the health insurance should check the aberrant medical treatment, and at the same time should be compensated for the their necessity and effectiveness. However there are always some structural differences between both requirements. This article aims to restate and analyse the development of the health insurance, based on the characteristics formed hitherto show the way to reform the health insurance. The problem to enhance the coverage of health insurance, its institutional as well as financial crisis, its peculiar governance would be handled.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.16 no.1
• /
• pp.221-254
• /
• 2015

The amendment of the Korea Civil Code will take place July 1, 2013. One of the most import issues related to adult guardianship system is a part. Though more than 100 new provisions, the revised Civil Code fundamentally reformed the guardianship system to establish a system to meet the diverse and complex needs of those who need a guardian and ensure due process. The new adult guardianship system intended to respect dignity and human right of mentally incapacitated adults, to guaranee their autunomy and to minimize the public interventions for assisting them. The new guardianship system for vulnerable adult has three kinds of legal guardianship system (adult guardianship, limited guardianship and specific guardianship). Mental patients forced the hospitalization of the mental health code and will be treated as an agreement incapable person. In principle an agreement incapable person has capacity of consent. The consent of the mental patients are admitted first. It is advisable to medical care only by the consent of the guardian when the the mental patient do not agree ability. If the mental patient do not agree with the mentally ill, but there should be a supervisory capacity for a guardianship of the couple guardian supervision. In conclusion, it not lost the capacity to consent to inpatient mental illness called. Therefore, we must discuss in detail the scope of the agreement for the mental patients. Mental Health Act amendments are necessary in accordance with the amended Civil Code.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.20 no.2
• /
• pp.261-285
• /
• 2019

The essential policy of suicide prevention is to continuously manage and treat suicide attempted people through data base related to suicide retry rate and follow-up study report. In Korea, only few people are allowed to follow-up by the Personal Information Protection Act. As a result, the research participation rate and the service participation rate are rather low, so that the research participants is limited to a part of the suicide attempted people. Therefore, the policy proposals to be improved in the Ministry of Health and Welfare Act were examined comparatively in order to increase the practical utilization of the suicide prevention about Article 14 and Article 20 of the Suicide Prevention Act. As a criterion for policy improvement, measures for non-discrimination of information to be considered in terms of technical and ethical dimensions and non-profit research and medical information for medical purposes were suggested. In addition to the severity of the suicide, the suicide risk was assessed and the criteria for the objective assessment of the follow-up observation were considered in consideration of the severity of the suicide.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.28 no.1
• /
• pp.173-218
• /
• 2018

This study focuses on the healthcare sector in Vietnam which is promoting universal health insurance for the achievement of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) under Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The purpose of this study is to examine the characteristics of the reform process of the health care system and the law on health insurance through the historical and cultural contexts and its implications from the perspective of development. Based on the three dimensions of UHC - extension of protection for population, provision of various medical services, and financial protection, the current status of the Vietnam healthcare sector is summarized respectively as follows. First, according to the revised Health Insurance law which came into effect in 2015, the mandatory health insurance premiums are calculated based on household units. Second, there is a medical network that can provide preventive and healthcare services centered on primary health care facilities, for example commune health stations (trạm y $t{\hat{e}}$ $X{\tilde{a}}$). Third, out-of-pocket expenditure is still a large proportion although public spending has increased and private spending has decreased since the enforcement of the health insurance law and various schemes. Vietnam is currently striving towards a universal health care system. The development of institutions and systems should be designed in a way that is appropriate for the members of the society rather than efficiency. This article findings shed light on the role of social values, family culture, and informal institutions.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.22 no.3
• /
• pp.31-55
• /
• 2021

The Personal Information Protection Act, one of the revised 3 Data Laws, established a special cases concerning pseudonymous data. As a result, a personal information controller may process pseudonymized information without the consent of data subjects for statistical purposes, scientific research purposes, and archiving purposes in the public interest, etc. In addition, as a follow-up to the revised Personal Information Protection Act, a 'Guidelines for Utilization of Healthcare Data' was prepared, which deals with the pseudonymization in the medical sector. The guidelines are meaningful in that they provide practical criteria for accomplices by defining specific interpretations and examples that take into account the characteristics of healthcare data. However, the guidelines need to clarify the purpose of using pseudonymous data and strengthen the fairness of the composition of the data deliberation committee. The guidelines also require establishing a healthcare data compensation framework and strengthening the protection of rights for vulnerable subjects. In addition, the guidelines need to be adjusted for inconsistency with the Bioethics and Safety Act and the Medical Service Act. It is expected that this study will contribute to the creation of a safe environment for the utilization of healthcare data as well as the improvement of related laws and systems.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.10 no.2
• /
• pp.455-492
• /
• 2009

(Background) Recent biotechnological breakthroughs are shedding new lights on various ethical and legal issues about human biological material. Since Rudolph Virchow, a German pathologist, had founded the medical discipline of cellular pathology, issues centering around human biological materials began to draw attention. The issues involving human biological materials were revisited with more attention along with series concerns when the human genome map was finally completed. Recently, with researches on human genes and bioengineering reaping enormous commercial values in the form of material patent, such changes require a society to reassess the present and future status of human tissue within the legal system. This in turn gave rise to a heated debate over how to protect the rights of material donors: property rule vs. no property rule. (Debate and Cases) Property rule recognizes the donors' property rights on human biological materials. Thus, donors can claim real action if there were any bleach of informed consent or a donation contract. Donors can also claim damages to the responsible party when there is an infringement of property rights. Some even uphold the concept of material patents overtaking. From the viewpoint of no property rule, human biological materials are objects separated from donors. Thus, a recipient or a third party will be held liable if there were any infringement of donor's human rights. Human biological materials should not be commercially traded and a patent based on a human biological materials research does not belong to the donor of the tissues used during the course of research. In the US, two courts, Moore v. Regents of the University of California, and Greenberg v. Miami Children's Hospital Research Institute, Inc., have already decided that research participants retain no ownership of the biological specimens they contribute to medical research. Significantly, both Moore and Greenberg cases found that the researcher had parted with all ownership rights in the tissue samples when they donated them to the institutions, even though there was no provision in the informed consent forms stating either that the participants donated their tissue or waived their rights to ownership of the tissue. These rulings were led to huge controversy over property rights on human tissues. This research supports no property rule on the ground that it can protect the human dignity and prevent humans from objectification and commercialization. Human biological materials are already parted from human bodies and should be treated differently from the engineering and researches of those materials. Donors do not retain any ownership. (Suggestions) No property rule requires a legal breakthrough in the US in terms of donors' rights protection due to the absence of punitive damages provisions. The Donor rights issue on human biological material can be addressed through prospective legislation or tax policies, price control over patent products, and wider coverage of medical insurance. (Conclusions) Amid growing awareness over commercial values of human biological materials, no property rule should be adopted in order to protect human dignity but not without revamping legal provisions. The donors' rights issue in material patents requires prospective legislation based on current uncertainties. Also should be sought are solutions in the social context and all these discussions should be based on sound medical ethics of both medical staffs and researchers.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.19 no.1
• /
• pp.143-163
• /
• 2018

Implant procedure belongs to so called a commercialized medical treatment, its procedure is simple and clear, and the possibility of success is almost 100%. In addition, it is a selective method rather than an inevitable method for a patient's health, so the importance of liability for explanation is especially emphasized for protection of autonomous decisions by patients. Considering these characteristics, the plaintiff in the relevant case said that the contract of implant procedure has the characteristic of subcontract, and only the failure of implant itself and the violation of liability for explanation should be the defendant's fault liability. In addition, although the above procedure contract is considered as delegation rather than subcontract, whether it's the defendant's malpractice should be judged by general people's common sense rather than average people in the industry. Therefore, if all the implanted teeth were removed due to bleeding and pains, and the patient suffered from dysaesthesia during the process, the defendant's malpractice is fully proved. When the judgements of implant medical malpractice were researched, the court doesn't consider implant contract as subcontract, but it judges dentist's malpractice by whether the implant itself is successful, so it seems that the court acknowledges similar characteristics with subcontract whose purpose is completion of work to some degree. In addition, considering the detailed contents of presented medical malpractices, it seems that judging medical malpractice is based on the common sense of general people. Therefore, the argument of the plaintiff is valid when the fact the adjustment amount is relevant to the amount that the plaintiff initially claimed is considered even though the relevant case was decided to be compulsory mediation.

• The Korean Journal of Emergency Medical Services
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.19-33
• /
• 2009

Purpose : To check the legal relation between rescue team and patient as well as legal responsibility for patient's damage intentionally or erroneously caused by rescue member, a public official, in the performance of relevant job ; to prevent legal dispute over rescue team and to present program for fair settlement of dispute and equitable and feasible burden of damage. Method : First, the legal principle of Civil Law, Criminal Law and Administrative Law related to the theme of this research will be investigated around research by literature. Second, the case of dispute related to rescue team will be introduced. Result: 1. If 119 rescue members as a public official intentionally or erroneously cause damage to patient in the performance of job, they shall bear civil, criminal and administrative responsibility. They shall bear civil responsibility for indemnity for damage due to default or tort. The typical criminal responsibility includes accidental homicide arising out of duty, preparing falsified official document, dereliction of duty, etc. In the administrative side, the state is responsible for indemnity for peculiar status of the rescue member, public official. 2. Though raising civil petition or legal dispute over unsatisfactory rescue service may be reasonable to guarantee the right of nation, such action may cause stress to rescue member as well as may lead to mental shrinking and defensive attitude only to take the basic first aid treatment which has low possibility of mistake instead of active first aid treatment so as to avoid legal responsibility. 3. The program that may prevent legal dispute over 119 rescue team includes expansion of manpower specialized in first aid treatment, enhancement of education on legal environment, development and application of standard job guideline, formation of mutual trust with patient, detailed explanation, preparing and keeping minute record, improvement of the rescue members' ability of first aid treatment and development of medical instruction mode. Conclusion : The best policy is to prevent legal dispute. If it is impossible to basically exclude the possibility of dispute, however, we need to make effort to minimize the occurrence, settle fairly and divide damage equitably and feasibly. To improve the preventible death rate of our first aid system to the level of advanced country, 119 rescue team which is in charge of the stage before hospital needs to positively enforce special first aid by improving the qualitative level of rescue service and to strive to prevent legal dispute that may occur in the process.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
• /
• v.18 no.2
• /
• pp.3-46
• /
• 2017

Physician's Duty of Information is classified into three categories by legal function: 'Duty of Information to Report' to fulfill the patient's right to know; 'Duty of Information to Guide' patient's convalescing and staying healthy; 'Duty of Information to Contribute' to patient's self-determination. We classify the physician's duty of information because the legal effect from the breach of duty varies accordingly. The legal effect is focused on damage compensation responsibility for breach of duty. When a physician violates 'Duty of Information to Report', he subjects himself to liability of compensation for infringing on the patient's 'Right to Know'. When a physician violates 'Duty of Information to Guide', she subjects herself to liability for general medical malpractice. Finally, when a physician violates 'Duty of Information to Contribute', the physician is basically liable for violation of the patient's 'Right to Self- Determination' which refers to infringement on freedom of choice. However, in the case of situation that patient's refusal to the medical treatment would be presumed, the physician bears all liability for the patient's damage which includes both of property and mental damage.