Empirical Research Of A Diversified Mechanism For Settling Medical Disputes

Since the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, especially since the reform and open ing up, great progress of China’s medical and health services has been made in the presentatio n of constantly enlarged medical service scale and significant increase of medical technical le vel. With the increase of medical needs, frequent happening of medical disputes has become a n unavoidable realistic condition. In this era when rule by law is advocated for, “medical disp ute” events characterized by professional and industrial dangers in some extreme cases are wa rning vulnerable patients who are under protection of with legal force. Meanwhile, there is a n eed to intervene in and deter illegal behaviors, such as attack medical workers and severely di sturb normal medical order of medical institutions. Moreover, practice “zero tolerance” for hu rting doctors violently and give criminal sanctions to involved people.Due to various reasons, it is impractical to rely only on the court for reasoning and settlin g disputes when medical disputes are complicated and special. Development of market econo my will certainly promote multiplex development of the society and the single jurisdiction po wer structure will be confronted with more crises. Though it is indispensable to establish jurid ical authority in this society ruled by law, the social composition of a mature country ruled by law is bound to be multiplex and so do the exercise of power and its organizational forms.Therefore, it is significant to regard judicial settlement as the final relieve function while basing on the formal judicial procedure and combining with a multiplex solution mechanism i n order to put doctors and patients in an equal-dialogue and negotiation relationship, provide more chances of autonomous selection for settling medical disputes, and achieve a win-win sit uation through practicing autonomy and right of punishment according to opinions of both par ties.This paper, by regarding Beijing as an example, referring to a great deal of literature, con ducting relevant questionnaires and on-site interviews, have attained first-hand information an d made a detailed comparison among relevant issues of medical disputes. Furthermore, this pa per has developed an overall understanding of settlement of medical disputes in practice and e xistent problems and come up with a new model for settling medical disputes in a multiplex w ay with a view to balancing interests between doctors and patients, relieving contradictions be tween both parties and providing a reasonable new path for establishing a harmonious doctorpatient relationship.