ABSTRACT
In recent years, violent disturbances caused by patient-hospital disputes have frequently occurred in China. This chapter summarizes all the cases in the past 12 years and analyzes how they emerged and escalated in terms of five dimensions: time, region, cause, form and consequence. It is revealed from the analysis of two typical cases that disturbances of patient-hospital disputes underwent four stages: emerging from the loss of patient-hospital trust, outbreak of violence, escalation of dispute and subsiding of the disturbance. In-depth factors contributing to such violent disturbances include: limitation of existing medical science and high expectation of patients, improper behavior and unsatisfactory quality of medical service providers, professionalization of medical dispute profiteers and lack of applicable laws, sympathy of the public with patients and inaccurate reports in the media.
(The author is an Associate Professor at the Department of Public Administration at East China University of Science and Technology.)
