A study on the scope of Massagist's massage services

According to the Medical Act of South Korea, massage services can only be performed by visually impaired persons who are qualified as massagists, so non-massagists cannot perform massage services and open massage parlors or massage centers. However, it is not easy to distinguish between massage services by massagists and massage services by non-massagists in the field, and since it can be considered as physical therapy under the Medical Technician Act or skin care services under the Public Health Management Act, confusion is bound to arise. In this paper, we will compare and review the differences between massage services, physical therapy services, and skin care services based on current laws and precedents to determine the scope of massage services and the future regulatory direction of the massagist system. If we divide the boundaries of massage services, if massage services inflict considerable physical impact on the body and there is a risk of health and hygiene hazards, it can be considered a medical practice, but if it is simply performed for the purpose of recovering from fatigue, it can be considered a non-medical health care service. On the other hand, massage work, physical therapy, and skin care all have in common that they apply ‘physical force or external force to the outside of the human body’ ‘using hands or tools.’ However, it can be understood that whether they are medical or non-medical health care services varies depending on the method, degree of physical force, and effect on the human body. Furthermore, in order for the massage therapist system to be maintained, the public should be able to directly distinguish and decide between massage parlors that can be established by massagists and massage businesses that can be established by skin care therapists. To this end, the characteristics of the massage business should be clearly stated as mentioned above, and it is necessary to reinforce the fact that the public feels that it has some health promotion effects beyond simple beauty. Therefore, in addition to disclosing the training course to become a massagist, continuous efforts for specialization such as developing and improving technologies related to the massage business are required.