Abstract: As an important part of social work，medical social work mainly aims at assisting patients to resolve various social problems relating to their diseases.Although it has been well developed in western industrialized countries and in Hong Kong and Taiwan，professional medical social work is still in its infancy in main land China.Based on his observation of the medical personnel and patients in 3 major hospitals in J City，and an analysis of unstandardized interviews，the author studies the common problems facing both the doctors and the patients.The study suggests that medical social work，as a “third party” in the “doctorpatient” relation，may function effectively in solving problems in the current medical system.Certainly，further discussion is needed as there may exist many unexpected difficulties in practice.

Key words: medical social work, medical personnel, medical institutions, patients, third party, predicament