A Dose of Medicine to Cure 'Medical Chaos': Medical Mediation in China

The doctor-patient relationship has been deteriorating in China since 2000. Acute conflict between doctors and patients occurs not only in the courtroom, but also in the street. In the event of adverse medical incidents, disgruntled patients or their relatives, along with their friends or entrepreneurial agitators, often physically attack medical staff and violently create chaos at the site of the hospital to express their anger and for the purpose of claiming compensation. This phenomenon is popularly called ‘medical chaos’. To restrain violence between doctors and patients and more generally to improve their relationship, the Chinese government has enthusiastically promoted medical people’s mediation as an alternative to the traditional medical dispute resolutions since 2010. It was reported that almost 90 percent of medical disputes went through mediation in the country. Despite the encouraging macro data, it remains unclear how medical mediation has been used to resolve medical disputes and lessen the strain between doctors and patients in the context of the current medical dispute crisis. This article aims to conduct a close examination and analysis of the medical mediation mechanism currently operating in China. It first reviews three representative models of medical mediation, that is, the Shanghai model, the Ningbo model and the Shenzhen model, and then discusses the special design of the medical mediation mechanism to meet its pragmatic function to cure medical chaos. It further analyses five existing practical problems of medical mediation, including the mediator quality and selection, the mediation procedure, the assistance of experts, the mediation quality, and the participation of the insurers. The article concludes with suggestions about the focus of medical mediation reform in the future.