Samsung Medical Center (SMC) came under fire after requiring an “obedience pledge” from public health doctors who were newly deployed to fill in the void of striking trainee physicians.

Recently, SMC issued “service commitment and consent forms” to the newly deployed public health doctors.

The consent forms included clauses such as "(the doctor) will obey instructions from superiors" and "(the doctor) will promptly compensate for losses in the event of hospital damage due to pledge violations." 

The consent forms received immediate backlash from public health doctors.

An SMC spokesperson clarified that the consent forms were originally intended for recruits for new specialists, not public health doctors. 

“Documents intended for new specialists were mistakenly bundled together. We have acknowledged the error and apologized to each public health doctor via telephone,” the spokesperson said. 

However, observers pointed out that even if the forms were intended for new specialist physicians, the use of the term “obey” would have been problematic.

Regarding the expression “obey,” the spokesperson said while the wording may seem questionable, it can be interpreted as a general guideline reflecting the hierarchical structure within medical institutions, emphasizing the importance of adhering to instructions from superiors.

Korea’s major university hospitals and medical institutions have been hit hard by the massive walkouts by trainee doctors who oppose the government’s plan to increase the medical school enrollment quota by 2,000 annually from the academic year of 2025. 

Recently, the government began to suspend medical licenses for three months of trainee doctors refusing to return to work but most junior doctors are defying the order. 

Earlier on Monday, the Ministry of Health and Welfare dispatched 20 military physicians and 138 public health doctors to help strike-hit 20 tertiary hospitals better cope with the shortage of doctors.