허위 진단서 등 작성과 관련된 법률 문제

Today, medical certificates are widely used in society; for example, for school enrollment and employment, as wellas for insurance purposes, and military service. In addition, they serve an important judicial function. Criminaland violent acts such as murder frequently occur, and traffic and industrial accidents that cause injury and intrudeupon a person’s life are increasing; therefore, the courts and the organizations required to deal with such cases areheavily dependent on medical certificates. Recently, a television program called ‘Madam’s Outgo’, that describesthe stay of execution of the wife of a company CEO, became a subject of public debate. The trial of the professorat a famous medical school, who received criticism for his major role in making a stay of execution possible forthe wife of the CEO, evokes the importance and social function of such medical certificates. Criminal laws andmedical laws institutionalize the important social function of medical certificates and establish regulations designedto prevent the writing of false medical certificates. This paper minimizes the use of legal terminology, concentratingon Supreme Court precedents, so that the main translation problems associated with such legal regulations can beutilized as data of doctors and non-jurists, and focuses its discussion on issues that can be practically discussed. Onthe basis of a theory of analysis of criminal guilt associated with false medical certificates, this paper suggests thatto be guilty of issuing of false medical certificates, the following elements are required to be proved: who (subject),what document (object), how it should be written to be classified as a false medical certificate (behavior), and whatsubjective facts should be perceived to be guilty of issuing of false medical certificates (intent), besides examiningthe medical requirements associated with writing medical certificates. It therefore appears necessary for the KoreanMedical Association to henceforth systematically review its “Guidelines for Writing Medical Certificates,” written inFebruary 2003, from a legal perspective.