Medical arbitration tribunal: current state and rospects

Abstract

Abstract. More than forty years ago, medical courts, which are arbitration tribunals (arbitration) for resolving medical malpractice disputes, emerged in the United States, while they remain relatively little known in our country. The problem of the study is the legal nature of medical disputes, the object is medical arbitration as a medico-legal phenomenon, the subject is the effectiveness of arbitration in resolving medical disputes. The issue of arbitrability, i.e. the admissibility of arbitration of a dispute: arbitration clauses are often challenged on the grounds that a patient could not reasonably express his or her will due to a medical condition. Despite conceptual difficulties, medical arbitration has been actively developed in the US since the 1980s. Its proponents emphasise a number of advantages over conventional litigation: speeding up the process, compensating a wider range of patients, reducing attorney fees, and improving patient safety. Opponents see as disadvantages the insufficient professional level of arbitrators, simplification of proceedings and its reduction to compensation payments, lack of connection between the activities of medical courts and improvement of the quality of medical care, transformation into an administrative procedure, "privatisation" of arbitration by large corporations. Some countries (South Korea, Indonesia, Mexico) implement arbitration in their country, but its results are rather modest. In Russia, medical disputes are characterised by increased complexity due to certain legal conditions. Alternative dispute resolution procedures are practically not used, and medical arbitration is expressly prohibited by the Code of Civil Procedure.