The Social Utilities of the Medical Certificates

, Gook-Jin Moon

Original Article

Korean Journal of Legal Medicine 1990;14(1):45-58.

Department of Legal Medicine, Korea University, College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea

Abstract

One of the most common areas in which the medical doctor comes into contact with legal matters is the provision of certificates. Certificates of health, illness or death required for a variety of causes including admission into school, private employment, travel, emigration, and legal proceedings, etc. All these documents must be made with meticulous accuracy, especially the completion of statutory and other official certificates. False statements, either from negligent carelessness or from willful intentions, may lead to disciplinary action or lawsuit by public procurators or victims, and to issue the medical certificates include many social or medical problems, therefore, this article discussed the problems and social requirements to the medical certificates, medical diagnosis and the problems of its social utilities, determination of prognosis of disease or injury and the problems of its social utilities, misdiagnosis, malingery and untrue diagnosis, and death and certificates, etc.