In light of increasing lawsuits filed against physicians and the resultant rise in defensive medicine, the Legislative Yuan yesterday approved an amendment to the Medical Act (醫療法) which sets out the conditions for physicians to face criminal charges in medical disputes.
The amendment was made to Article 82 of the act, which formerly stated that “medical facilities and its paramedics should compensate for any harm they cause a patient in the course of performing their duties on the condition that the harm was intentional or a result of negligence.”
The amended article reads: “Paramedics who injure or kill a patient in the course of providing medical treatment due to negligence over items that require attention and nonclinical judgements face criminal liabilities.”
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
“The two aforementioned violations should be determined after factoring in the branch of medicine practiced, the prevalent medical practice, medical skills, the condition of medical equipment used and work conditions at the time and place of the incident, as well as the urgency of treatment,” it says.
Medical facilities that harm a patient due to negligence should compensate the patient, it stipulates.
Lawmakers across party lines also lent support to two supplementary resolutions, proposed by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), that require the Ministry of Health and Welfare to submit a draft bill before Jan. 31 that defines rules governing medical disputes, and to assist the central government in establishing unified reporting and troubleshooting systems for such disputes.
DPP Legislator Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀), who led the legislation, said the amendment was not meant to protect doctors or decriminalize negligence, but to refine the article.
The change would encourage doctors to take risks when attempting to save lives, since it prevents patients or their families who want to receive monetary compensation under the Civil Code from threatening their physician with criminal charges, Lin said.
Citing statistics compiled by the ministry, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chen Yi-min (陳宜民) said the number of lawsuits filed against paramedics in 2014 was 3.5 times the number three decades ago: 146 per year between 1987 and 1990, and 534 from 2011 to 2014.
This has discouraged many physicians from taking up high-risk branches of medicine, resulting in a brain drain in these fields, he said.
However, New Power Party Executive Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) said the amendment failed to address the root cause of medical disputes.
He said that while he could relate to the premise, he doubted whether defining circumstances under which doctors face criminal liabilities would help decrease the number of lawsuits against doctors.
Now that legal action by patients is more likely to come in the form of civil lawsuits, compensation could be demanded of doctors like a “contract,” in which a party accuses another of “failing to perform an obligation,” Huang said.
“Whether my predictions will come true, I believe that time will tell,” he added.
Hong Kong-based American singer-songwriter Khalil Fong (方大同) has passed away at the age of 41, Fong’s record label confirmed yesterday. “With unwavering optimism in the face of a relentless illness for five years, Khalil Fong gently and gracefully bid farewell to this world on the morning of February 21, 2025, stepping into the next realm of existence to carry forward his purpose and dreams,” Fu Music wrote on the company’s official Facebook page. “The music and graphic novels he gifted to the world remain an eternal testament to his luminous spirit, a timeless treasure for generations to come,” it said. Although Fong’s
China’s military buildup in the southern portion of the first island chain poses a serious threat to Taiwan’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply, a defense analyst warned. Writing in a bulletin on the National Defense and Security Research’s Web site on Thursday, Huang Tsung-ting (黃宗鼎) said that China might choke off Taiwan’s energy supply without it. Beginning last year, China entrenched its position in the southern region of the first island chain, often with Russia’s active support, he said. In May of the same year, a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) force consisting of a Type 054A destroyer, Type 055 destroyer,
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) was questioned by prosecutors for allegedly orchestrating an attack on a taxi driver after he was allegedly driven on a longer than necessary route in a car he disliked. The questioning at the New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office was ongoing as of press time last night. Police have recommended charges of attempted murder. The legally embattled actor — known for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代) — is under a separate investigation for allegedly using fake medical documents to evade mandatory military service. According to local media reports, police said Wang earlier last year ordered a
Taiwan is planning to expand the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-based X-ray imaging to customs clearance points over the next four years to curb the smuggling of contraband, a Customs Administration official said. The official on condition of anonymity said the plan would cover meat products, e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products, large bundles of banknotes and certain agricultural produce. Taiwan began using AI image recognition systems in July 2021. This year, generative AI — a subset of AI which uses generative models to produce data — would be used to train AI models to produce realistic X-ray images of contraband, the official
RSS