OBJECTIVES: It has been well recognized that health care cost is strongly dependent on age. The study aims at estimating the magnitude and distribution of lifetime medical costs. METHODS: We employ a period life table model using single year’s medical expenditures from Korea National Health Insurance Corporation, population data and life table from Korean Statistical Agency. To estimate lifetime medical costs for male and female, 100,000 hypothetical cohorts for each sex whose mortality rate coming from life table is constructed and assigned to medical costs at each age and sex. This procedure permits us to estimate lifetime medical costs at each age and for each sex. The method used here is to conceptually convert cross-sectional costs data into a longitudinal pattern of costs, which generates profiles of medical cost from birth to death. RESULTS: The average member of the birth cohort will spend 74,150 thousands Won(98,883 PPP US$) for man and 87,868 thousands Won(117,177 PPP US$) for woman in 2007 over the course of his or her life. Total lifetime medical cost is 19 percent higher for females than males due to mainly life expectancy difference. For the average life table member, half of all lifetime cost occurs after about age 65. We also estimate the distribution of lifetime medical cost by phases of life course. For a male(female), 12.7(9.2) percent of a cohort’s expenditures occurs from birth to age 19; 8.4(10.0) percent accrues during ages 20~39; 30.2(28.4) percent is expended during ages 40~64; 42.7(44.0%) percent is realized during ages 65~84; 5.9(8.4) percent accrues over age 85. CONCLUSIONS: The findings of this study are similar to the patterns of medical costs of other countries’ experiences provided by other literatures - high during infancy, low during childhood and young adulthood, then rising during middle-age and rapidly growing during the senior years.