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Introduction: Occupational risks affecting each healthcare professional are diverse and significantly affect their physical and psychological condition. They can conditionally be divided into risks resulting from: 1) the impact of the work process and pose a risk to the life and health of healthcare professionals; 2) the activities of healthcare professionals and pose a potential risk to the patients lives and health. The latter group poses a threat of criminal liability for the healthcare professional. It is the task of each state to ensure safe working conditions for the effective performance of their duties by healthcare specialists. However, according to the study, the analyzed Eastern European countries lack accurate statistics on occupational diseases of healthcare professionals, while the latter often do not seek specialized care and are treated on their own. The aim: to identify the types and causes of occupational risks for healthcare professionals working in the countries of Eastern Europe; to investigate the legislation of these countries under which medical professionals may be prosecuted/held guilty and, thus, criminally liable for causing harm to their patients.Materials and methods: Legislation of the Republic of Belarus, Republic of Moldova, Russian Federation and Ukraine, international declarations and conventions, research papers, case law of the European Court of Human Rights, national court decisions of some East European countries.Conclusions: Occupational risks to the healthcare professionals are risks to his or her life and health and risks of criminal liability for causing harm to the patient. The causes of the first type risk are: a significant prevalence proportion of infectious diseases; the use of faulty medical equipment; unregulated working day and low salaries; medical attendance of patients prone to aggression, etc. The healthcare professional shall be criminally responsible only if he/she is found guilty for infliction of harm to the life and health of the patient and the presence of the obligatory signs of a specific crime in his/her actions.

Objective Introduction: Infliction of harm to life and health due to medical errors is common for the whole world and post-Soviet countries, in particular. The problem of these errors is one of the most important in medical law, although there is no unified concept of it. A small number of sentences in cases of criminal negligence of medical professionals indicates a high latency and often unprovability of this crime in a number of post-Soviet countries. The aim: To disclose the objective and subjective prerequisites of a medical error, reasons for its occurrence, to establish the grounds for criminal liability of medical professionals in case they commit an error and to examine the judicial practice in this regard. Also, to define the concept and types of circumstances exempting criminal liability and their impact on criminal liability issues concerning medical professionals. Patients and methods Materials and methods: The study is based on the Belarusian, Kazakh, Moldavian and Ukrainian statutory acts as well as international acts, the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), national court judgments. Such methods as dialectical, comparative, analytic, synthetic and comprehensive have been used in the paper. Results Review: On the basis of the study, it has been established that there is no unified concept of a medical error, medical personnel are fairly brought to criminal liability only if they commit an unjustifiable error in the presence of all the mandatory elements of a crime provided for in the relevant article of the Criminal Code. At the same time, it is extremely difficult to prove existence of such an error. Besides, at the state levels, causes and mechanisms of occurring errors have not been revealed, they are not even discussed, which makes it impossible to outline measures to prevent them or reduce their frequency and degree of danger. Conclusion Conclusions: The struggle against medical errors should encompass a number of such activities as standardization of clinical treatment protocols, further education of medical professionals and lawyers in regard to patient safety, thorough investigation of each incident in order to exclude a justifiable error or circumstances exempting criminal liability. Equitable, severe and uncompromising punishments for perpetrators should be an effective means preventing commission of crimes in medicine.