South Korea's telemedicine industry is pushing back against a draft revision to the Medical Service Act's enforcement rules that would limit remote consultations to seven days' worth of medication. If the rules take effect, the industry says, chronic disease patients who take the same drugs long term would have to see a doctor far more often than necessary.
The telemedicine industry has asked the Ministry of Health and Welfare to fully reconsider the draft revision, industry officials said on the 23rd.
Under the current draft, prescriptions for first-visit patients would be capped at seven days. A 30-day prescription would be allowed only once.
Lee Seul, co-chair of the Telemedicine Industry Council under the Korea Startup Forum, criticized the plan at a press conference the same day. "After six years of temporary approvals and pilot programs, telemedicine has finally been written into law, but we now face a paradox of legalization in which the scope available to the public is extremely limited," she said.
Sun Jae-won, co-chief executive of Meraki Place, which operates the Only My Doctor service, also raised concerns. "Over three years of pilot programs, 2.76 million people used telemedicine, but under the current draft rules, a significant number of patients would face the seven-day prescription cap or be unable to use telemedicine at all," he said.
Sun pointed to the burden of repeat visits for chronic disease patients. "In particular, 73% of hypertension prescriptions run 30 days or longer. If a seven-day cap applies, patients would have to be seen four times to get the same four weeks of medication," he said.
Jang Young-joo, chief executive of Goodoc, made a similar point. "Seeing a doctor for the first time does not mean the patient is starting treatment for the first time," the CEO said. "We hope the government reconsiders whether such limits are really necessary even for patients whose treatment records and current medications can be verified."
The council plans to run a signature campaign among telemedicine users calling for a review of the draft rules. It will also petition government bodies including the presidential Regulatory Rationalization Committee and the health ministry to ease the restrictions.
This is not the first time calls have been made to review the draft revision on telemedicine.
The government's revised enforcement rules are set to take effect on Dec. 24.