In Re Medical Review Panel of Howard
In re MEDICAL REVIEW PANEL OF Lucinda A. HOWARD.
Supreme Court of Louisiana.
Israel M. Augustine, Augustine & Bagert, New Orleans, for applicant.
Robert D. Ford and Franklin D. Beahm, Thomas Hayes & Beahm, New Orleans, for respondent.
LEMMON, Justice[*].
The issue in this case is whether plaintiff's medical malpractice claim against certain *473 defendants for causing the wrongful death of her husband is barred by prescription.
Dr. R. Cailouette was the emergency room physician on duty at Jo Ellen Smith Hospital on September 26, 1985 when plaintiff's husband was admitted to the hospital after sustaining multiple stab wounds. Dr. Cailouette provided initial treatment of the wounds for about two hours. Another physician subsequently performed emergency surgery, but the patient died the next day.
On April 9, 1986, plaintiff filed a claim against the hospital with the Commissioner of Insurance pursuant to La.Rev.Stat. 40:1299.47. She alleged that her husband's death was caused by the negligence of employees of the hospital or of other persons for whom the hospital was responsible.
Inasmuch as the Medical Malpractice Act does not require responsive pleadings by a qualified health care provider against whom a claim is filed with the Commissioner, the hospital did not admit or deny any of the allegations of plaintiff's pleading, but did initiate discovery by filing interrogatories and requests for production and by taking plaintiff's deposition. The medical review panel required by the Act was eventually constituted, the last member being selected on June 29, 1987.
On November 4, 1987, the hospital submitted a memorandum to the panel. Service of the memorandum on plaintiff notified her for the first time that the doctor who undertook her husband's treatment when he presented himself to the hospital in the emergency room was not the hospital's employee, but rather was an employee of Keith Van Meter & Associates, a medical group which had contracted with the hospital to provide professional services in the hospital's emergency department.[1] The hospital, asserting that the only hospital employees involved in the case were the nurses in the emergency room and in the surgical and intensive care units, contended that there was no evidence of negligence by any of these employees.
The medical review panel ruled on January 12, 1988 that the evidence did not establish any deviation by employees of the hospital from the appropriate standard of care.
On January 25, 1988, plaintiff filed a supplemental claim with the Commissioner, requesting that the medical review panel conduct a further review of the responsibility of Keith Van Meter & Associates and a named physician in connection with the death of her husband. The claim asserted that both Van Meter and the doctor were qualified health care providers and that the doctor was the emergency doctor assigned to the hospital by Van Meter on the night of the alleged malpractice described in the original claim.[2]
Van Meter filed an exception of prescription, which was maintained by the trial court.
On appeal the intermediate court affirmed the dismissal of the claim.
*474 We granted certiorari to review the correctness of the decisions of the lower courts.
The periods of limitation for filing medical malpractice claims are provided in La.Rev.Stat. 9:5628, which requires an action for damages against doctors and hospitals arising out of patient care to be brought (1) within one year of the date of the act or omission, (2) within one year of the date of discovery of the act or omission, or (3) at the latest, in all events, within three years of the date of the act or omission.[4]Crier v. Whitecloud,
In the present case the claim against Van Meter was filed within one year of the date plaintiff claims she discovered that Van Meter was the true employer of the emergency room doctor whose identity was unknown to plaintiff at the time of the claim, as well as within three years of the act or omission which allegedly caused plaintiff's husband's death. The claim filed against Van Meter therefore clearly fits within the statutory time periods, unless an earlier date of discovery applies.
The key inquiry in most contra non valentem cases is the commencement date of the one-year prescriptive period under the discovery rule. The doctrine itself is based on the theory that when the claimant is not aware of the facts giving rise to his or her cause of action against the particular defendant, the running of prescription is for that reason suspended until the tort victim discovers or should have discovered the facts upon which his or her cause of action is based. Lott v. Haley,
Constructive knowledge sufficient to commence the running of prescription requires something more than a mere apprehension that something might be wrong. Cordova v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co.,
In determining the date of commencement of prescription in "should have discovered" cases, this court in recent cases following Cordova and Young has focused on the reasonableness of the claimant's action or inaction. In Jordan v. Employee Transfer Corp.,
*475 In Griffin v. Kinberger,
In the present case plaintiff reasonably believed that when her husband presented himself for treatment at the hospital, he was treated by employees of the hospital. While she could have utilized discovery to determine the names of the health care providers, it was not necessary for her to do so if they were hospital employees, which plaintiff reasonably believed to be the case. Moreover, plaintiff's reasonable belief in this regard was reinforced when the hospital, sued six months after the incident, undertook discovery in an effort to defend the claim without denying vicarious responsibility for the emergency room physician who, according to the hospital's own records, administered the critical first two hours of treatment. While Van Meter did not itself mislead plaintiff, it joined with the hospital in setting up the circumstances from which plaintiff drew her reasonable conclusion about the employment relationship between the emergency room doctor and the hospital. Plaintiff was further lulled into believing inquiry into the relationship between the hospital and the emergency room doctor was unnecessary by the peculiar provisions of the Medical Malpractice Act which excused the health care provider, sued six months before prescription ran, from revealing the inaccuracy of the plaintiff's reasonable belief as to the employment relationship until the normal prescriptive period had fully accrued.[6]
Under the particular circumstances of this case we conclude that plaintiff's belief that the hospital employed the emergency room doctor was reasonable and the plaintiff's ignorance of Van Meter's employment relationship with the doctor, a fact necessary for her to assert her cause of action against Van Meter, was not willful or inexcusably negligent. Cordova v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co.,
Accordingly, the judgments of the lower courts are reversed, the exception of prescription is overruled, and the case is remanded for further proceedings.
WATSON, Justice, concurring.
Although I agree with the majority that the exception of prescription should be overruled, I concur to note that the factual question of whether the hospital is responsible for any negligence by the emergency room physicians has not been decided by a trier of fact. See Hastings v. Baton Rouge Gen. Hosp.,
NOTES
Notes
[*] Judge Melvin A. Shortess of the Court of Appeal, First Circuit, participated in this decision as Associate Justice Pro Tempore.
[1] Under the contract Van Meter recruited, scheduled and supervised doctors who operated the emergency department around the clock.
[2] On March 8, 1988, plaintiff corrected the amended claim to name Dr. Cailouette as the emergency room doctor who allegedly caused her husband's death.
[3] In the court of appeal plaintiff also urged that the Medical Malpractice Act's lack of a requirement of a prompt response by the health care provider, while at the same time holding the malpractice victim to strict rules of prescription, denied her due process and equal protection of the laws. The court of appeal refused to consider this contention because plaintiff had not raised unconstitutionality in the trial court. While we do not necessarily agree that an appellate court should not consider a constitutional issue not raised in the trial court when no evidence is necessary and the opposing party is not prejudiced by the failure to raise the issue below, we do not reach the constitutional issue in deciding the present case.
[4] The first two periods are clearly prescriptive periods, as contrasted to peremptive periods. The major difference is that a prescriptive period may be suspended or interrupted, while a peremptive period may not. La.Civ.Code art. 3452, 3458 and 3461.
[5] The court noted that the language in Cartwright v. Chrysler Corp.,
[6] If the present case had been initiated by petition filed in the district court under the Code of Civil Procedure, the original defendant (hospital) would have been required to admit or deny the allegations of the petition as to the hospital's vicarious responsibility for the emergency room personnel.