Impact of Medical Litigation on Diagnostic Tests in Hospitals: Evidence from China
HKUST IEMS Thought Leadership Brief No. 90
SHARE THIS
In China, medical litigation against hospitals due to malpractice has been increasing year by year. This potential medical liability risk has led hospitals and physicians to adopt various defensive medicine practices, one of which is over-testing. As a result of medical litigation, there has been a significant decline in the positive rate of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) tests, driven largely by an increase in negative cases. The findings reveal significant heterogeneity in how hospitals respond to court rulings, with losing hospitals exhibiting more pronounced over-testing practices than their winning counterparts. Consequently, the annual cost of additional MRI tests resulting from losing a lawsuit amounts to approximately $1.21 billion USD nationwide.
About the author
Hyuncheol Bryant Kim is an Associate Professor in the Economics Department and Division of Public Policy at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He is an applied empirical micro-economist focusing on causal impacts of policy interventions in health and education sectors through large scale data analysis and social experiment. The main goal of his research is to understand the fundamental relationship between human capital investment and individual and societal well-being in Africa and Asia, which is insufficiently understood. He received an MD from Yonsei University, Korea, MPH from Seoul National University, Korea, and PhD in Economics from Columbia University, USA. His research is published in leading journals such as Science, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Health Economics, and other international journals.
Xiaotong Li is a PhD candidate in the Division of Public Policy at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Her research interests broadly lie in health economics, policy evaluation, and applied microeconomics. Currently, she is working on projects related to how various financial and non-financial incentives affect the behaviors of healthcare providers and how these behaviors, in turn, impact patient outcomes.
Get updates from HKUST IEMS
