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KMID : 0986720100180010149
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Korean Journal of Medicine and Law
2010 Volume.18 No. 1 p.149 ~ p.176
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Doctors" Duty of Care and Their Legal Liability in Emergency Care
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Moon Seong-Jea
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Abstract
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According to latest statistics published by Statistics Korea (KOSTAT), it is found that all mortal cases recorded in Korea over a decade (since 1998) were attributed mostly to cerebrovascular and circulatory system diseases (e.g, hypertensive diseases, arteriosclerosis and heart diseases), which were followed by cancers, traffic accidents, suicide and other various accidents. Among major 3 causes of current mortality in Korea, it is typical that circulatory system diseases and accidents require emergency care. Here, it is expected that the number of cases attacked by circulatory system diseases will be increasing a lot due to changing dietary life and lifestyle of our contemporary people. And in the situation of increasing hazardous facilities involving potential accidents in response to advanced industrial development, it is required to newly build emergency medical service system (EMSS) in the future.
The EMSS aims to re-distribute medical or paramedical personnel, facilities and appliances for their coordinated operations, so that first-aid and medical services can be provided effectively and quickly for emergency cases found at certain area and location. In other words, EMSS refers to such a medical support system as medical or paramedical personnel carry out proper first-aid treatments for emergency cases on site before prompt and secured transfer to appropriate medical institutions for emergency care of those cases, so that emergency care personnel working for those institutions employ medical technologies and appliances to effectively treat and remedy emergency cases. In order to achieve these goals, it is necessary to create a coordinated cooperation system among on-site emergency treatment team (119 rescue team), emergency care information center (dial # 1339), emergency care center and medical or paramedical personnel for emergency care at hospital.
Contrary to common medical services, the emergency care involves its specific requirements, and also has limitations in concluding prognosis of emergency cases after treatment due to severity and diversity of illness, uncertainty of illness, and unpredictability of illness. Furthermore, emergency cases involve difficulties in predicting their onset or recurrence, so there are additional problems like difficult selection of medical care options, and demanding placement of medical or paramedical personnel. In particular, there are many challenges in medical treatment of emergency cases due to urgency of disease conditions, sudden change of lesion, and insufficient information on patients. Starting from these critical minds, this study focused on discussing doctors" duty of care and their responsibility in emergency care, apart from legal issues exposed in general medical services as possible. To facilitate such discussions, it is advisable to point out questions shown in Korean judicial cases concerning emergency care, analyze what they involve and suggest favorable orientations of emergency care. However, there are not so many judicial cases concerning those questions, so this study introduced relevant judicial precedents in Japan to develop discussions for more convenience of comprehension.
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KEYWORD
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hypertensive diseases, heart diseases, cancers, suicide, emergency care, circulatory system diseases, EMSS, emergency medical service system
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FullTexts / Linksout information
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Listed journal information
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