Two hospitals that refused to accept a critically ill 4-year-old patient have been ordered by a South Korean court on Thursday to pay a combined 400 million won ($272,000) in damages to the child’s family.
The Busan District Court’s Western Branch ruled that the hospitals were responsible for 70 percent of the total damages claimed by the bereaved family of the late Kim Dong-hee, according to the Korea Alliance of Patients Organization.
Kim underwent a tonsillectomy at a university hospital in Yangsan, South Gyeongsang Province, on Oct. 4, 2019. After being discharged, he was admitted to a secondary hospital in Busan for follow-up care, where he later began vomiting blood.
His condition rapidly worsened, but the hospital’s ER, manned by an unreported proxy on-call doctor, did not provide adequate treatment. Instead, he transferred him to an ambulance without properly handing over the patient’s medical records.
Paramedics attempted to return the child, who was already unconscious at that time, to the hospital where the surgery had been performed, which was also the nearest facility. That hospital refused to accept him on two occasions, saying it had to deal with a patient undergoing cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
Investigators later confirmed that no such patient was present at the time.
The ambulance then went to another university hospital in Busan, approximately 20 kilometers away. Kim never recovered consciousness and remained on life support for about five months before dying in March 2020.
In its ruling Thursday, the Busan court said that both hospitals should be held responsible for the child’s death, since their violation of the Emergency Medical Service Act was a major cause of the child’s death.
In a separate criminal case, the Ulsan District Court fined the hospital that performed the surgery 10 million won ($6,800) and an emergency room doctor 5 million won ($3,400) for refusing to accept Kim without justifiable reason.
Another doctor at the hospital where Kim was later treated was also fined 5 million won. However, the court acquitted the defendants of charges of death by occupational negligence.
The Korea Alliance of Patients Organization described Thursday’s ruling as a symbolic decision confirming that hospitals can be held legally responsible for refusing emergency patients.
Similar cases continue to occur in South Korea, where patients are denied admission at emergency rooms and are forced to travel long distances or wait for hospitals willing to accept them, even in life-threatening situations.
In December, an 18-year-old died in Busan after more than a dozen hospitals refused to accept the patient, citing a lack of pediatric neurological services or limits on treating minors in cardiac arrest.
tammy@heraldcorp.com
