의료광고 관련 의료법 개정과정의 문제점과 의료광고 사전심의제도 등의 개선방안

Medicine, unlike regular products or services, is greatly influenced by the professionals and has the tendency for asymmetric information disclosure. Therefore, even when advertisements are permitted, rational decision making is difficult and there is a high possibility of distorting consumer decisions. It is perceived that such distinctive characteristics lead to the inevitable controls on the ways and contents of medical advertisement. On October 27th 2005, medical law regulation on medical advertisement was found unconstitutional at the Constitutional Court. And three years have passed since the revised medical law (April 4th2007),which roots on the conversion from “prohibition in principle” to “permission in principle” and the introduction of pre-review system, was implemented. Even though much of the confusion during the early system implementation period seems to have settled down, there still exist many core problems due to the institutional limitation. The revision process of medical law on medical advertisement, hastily pushed ahead to fill the legislative gap caused by the external factor via the Constitutional Court, carries many descriptive legislative problems. The reform of medical advertisement pre-review system, which is still disputed over its unconstitutionality, is needed in order to tackle the problems. Rather than consigning government’s authority to private sector, autonomic private organization should entirely take charge. And the review organizations currently dispersed throughout different health care providers should be integrated and put together in order to enhance review’s fairness, unity, and efficiency. Also, the permission scope of the medical advertisement should be extended by eliminating overlapping matters among legislations through the reevaluation of prohibited advertisement types conforming to the medical advertisement reform purpose. [Key words：medical law, medical advertisement, pre-review system, unconstitutional at the Constitutional Court, television advertisement]The scope of the medical advertisement principle agent should be expanded to medical institution establisher, and while television advertisement is permitted, false or exaggerated advertisement should be prevented. Also by categorizing illegal medical advertisement by types, clear determination of punishment code should be settled.