The South Korean insurance industry will fund the review committee that will consider the appropriateness of allowing vehicle accident victims with minor injuries to claim the costs of medical treatment that lasts for eight weeks or longer.
Once the framweork is implemented, minor-injury patients seeking treatment for eight weeks or longer must submit medical records and other documents, which will be reviewed by Korea’s Traffic Accident Compensation Supervisory Service (TACSS).
Currently, all minor-injury patients submit a medical certificate and other documents after four weeks of treatment to receive additional care.
Korea’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) pushed the eight-week rule with the view that treatment for minor-injury patients should conclude within eight weeks.
According to media reports, the review committee consists of Western and Korean medicine doctors. These doctors are from TACSS, an agency under MOLIT. The committee will decide whether additional treatment is necessary. If it is warranted, patients can receive treatment covered by insurance benefits. Otherwise, they must pay out of pocket.
The insurance industry has argued that treatment has often been extended indefinitely without verification, leading to overtreatment. If some customers receive excessively frequent treatment, insurers' performance deteriorates, which in turn leads to higher premiums for other policyholders.
The new review set-up will be similar to the structure for reviewing automobile insurance medical bills. The Automobile Insurance Review Centre conducts reviews to determine whether the medical bills claimed by hospitals are appropriate. Insurers and mutual aid associations bear the expense, including labour costs, to operate the centre.