A Study of the Medical Practice and the Right of Patients to Self-determination - Focusing on Supreme Court Decision 2009DO14407 Delivered on June 24, 2014 -

의료행위와 환자의 자기결정권에 관한 고찰 - 대법원 2014. 6.26. 선고 2009도14407 판결을 중심으로 -

The Supreme Court made a decision that the doctor cannot be punished for not taking a blood transfusion to the patient, depending on the patient's will to refuse the blood transfusion on June 24, 2014. The reason is that, in a special situation of conflict between the right of patients to self-determination and the duty of care, and when it was impossible to compare whether which has the superior value, if the doctor made a medical practice to respect either of those two values according to the professional sense, he cannot be punished. In principle, the doctor should make medical practices according to the patient's will. However, if the patient's life was at stake, I think, the doctor is obliged to try his best to save the life of patient. Yet to entrust the patient's life to the doctors professional sense, is to give up the obligation of the country to protect lives. In this regard, I think that the Supreme Court Decision should be reviewed, and that an ongoing research is needed.