대형종합병원의 선택진료비 및 치료재료비의 부당징수 행위에 대한 연구

On 28th September 2009, the KFTC imposed the surcharge of 3.04 billion won with the order of correction on 8 large general hospitals for levying unfair expense of selecting doctors or medical materials by using their superior position to the patients. The target hospitals of the order of correction include the Korean prominent general hospitals, such as Seoul Asan Hospital, Sin-chon Severance Hospital, and Sam-sung Seoul hospital, and the order was the result from the investigation that had been preceded from July to September 2008. There were several types of acts that violated the Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act such as unfair charging fees for selecting a doctor(8 hospitals) or materials for medical(2 hospitals). KFTC judged that this violation were under the “Offering Disadvantage” which is one of the type of “Unfair trade practices” under the Article 23.1.4 of the Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act (Unfairly Taking Advantage of One’s Position in Trade). In the large general hospitals, doctors had more access to information than patients, and patients had limitations in selecting their hospitals and doctors. In this situation, the hospitals unfairly took the advantage of their position to patients in trade. As a result, the trade between the hospitals and patients became abnormal therefore patients couldn’t expect the unfair charging fees and should have paid fees unfairly. In this respect, the KFTC judged that the hospitals violated the law. The KFTC imposed the surcharge of 3.04 billion won with the order of correction on 8 large general hospitals for levying unfair expense of selecting doctors, and gave the order of correction on 2 hospitals for levying unfair charge of medical materials. This judgment was meaningful, because it was the first time applying Fair Trade laws to Korean prominent general hospitals’ process of charging fees. However selecting doctors were caused by the dissymmetry of information between doctors and patients. Charging fees on medical treatments also were the kind of ‘actual cost compensation’ for the patients. According to these facts, even though the structural and systematic improvement of the hospitals was necessary, the judgment, that these actions were under the “Offering Disadvantage” which was one of the type of “Unfair trade practices” under the Article 23.1.4 of the Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act (Unfairly Taking Advantage of One’s Position in Trade), should be carefully examined.