“Non-Face-to-Face Treatment Pilot Project for Medical Institutions: Government’s Temporary Solution Until Institutionalization”

Operation of a pilot project centered on return visits from the new month

Allowing first visits to islands, remote areas, the elderly, and the disabled
For first-time visits to children, listen to more opinions and supplement them
Video call principle… Send prescriptions to pharmacies
Transition to main business upon passage of medical amendment

Until non-face-to-face treatment is institutionalized, the government has decided to temporarily operate a non-face-to-face treatment pilot project centered on clinic-level medical institutions and returning patients. It will take effect on the 1st of next month, and if the amendment to the Medical Act to institutionalize non-face-to-face treatment is passed, the pilot project will be finished and converted to the main project.

On the 17th, the Ministry of Health and Welfare announced plans for a non-face-to-face treatment pilot project through consultations with the government. Non-face-to-face treatment is when a doctor treats and prescribes over the phone or video without meeting the patient in person. On the 1st of next month, if the crisis level goes down from ‘severe’ to ‘warning’, the basis for allowing non-face-to-face treatment will also disappear.

The National Assembly is promoting the institutionalization of non-face-to-face treatment, but it is expected that it will take some time to legislate, so the government plans to fill the gap until legislation. The target is a patient who has experienced face-to-face treatment at least once. Since it is centered on clinic-level medical institutions, most of them are patients with mild diseases.

Non-face-to-face treatment for first-time patients and hospital-level medical institutions is planned to be implemented on a very limited basis. Non-face-to-face treatment at hospital-level medical institutions will be implemented for patients with rare diseases who have received face-to-face treatment at least once at the hospital, and for patients who are judged by doctors to need continuous care after surgery or treatment. Patients who can receive non-face-to-face treatment from the first visit are patients in islands and remote areas where medical institutions are lacking, people with mobility difficulties, such as the elderly over 65 and the disabled, who are judged by doctors to need non-face-to-face treatment, and patients with confirmed infectious diseases.

A plan to allow first-diagnosis non-face-to-face treatment for children under the age of 18 only on holidays or weekday nights (6:00 p.m. to 9:00 a.m. the next day) was reviewed, but there were concerns that medical accidents such as misdiagnoses could occur, so it was decided to listen to more opinions and supplement them. . It is pointed out that children need more than one face-to-face treatment because it is difficult to express their condition clearly.

Park Dae-dal, chairman of the People’s Power Policy Committee, said at the briefing of the party-governmental consultation, “Even during the pilot project, we plan to periodically evaluate the system, such as the range of target patients, whether to expand first visits, and how to receive them, and continue to supplement them.”

The method of treatment is video call in principle. Only patients who do not have a smartphone or have difficulty using video communication are allowed to receive phone treatment as an exception. When conducting non-face-to-face treatment, the doctor must be in a medical institution. After the non-face-to-face treatment is completed, the prescription is sent by fax or e-mail to the pharmacy designated by the patient. Patients and pharmacists can negotiate and receive surrogates. It may be difficult for patients in islands and remote areas to find a pharmacy and receive medicines, so they decided to find supplementary measures. Drug delivery is opposed by pharmacists.

Drugs misused and abused, such as drugs and drugs for erectile dysfunction, cannot be prescribed through non-face-to-face treatment. It has decided not to operate medical institutions that only provide non-face-to-face treatment and pharmacies that specialize in drug delivery that only handle prescription drugs.

Reporters Lee Hyeon-jeong and Choi Hyeon-wook