Corrigan v. Methodist Hospital

158 F.R.D. 70, 1994 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15619
District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania·Decided November 1, 1994·No. Civ. A. No. 94-CV-1478·Published·Cited by 10 cases

Opinion

MEMORANDUM

JOYNER, District Judge.

Before the Court is a Motion of Defendant Methodist Hospital for Judgment on the Pleadings as to Counts III, VII and VIII of Plaintiffs Complaint. Also before the Court is Defendant Davne’s Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings as to Count VIII of Plaintiffs Complaint, in the form of a Joinder to Methodist’s Motion.

The facts of this case have been discussed in earlier opinions of this Court and will not be repeated here.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

In this Motion, Defendants seek Judgment on the Pleadings under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c). This rule gives District Courts the power to enter judgment based solely on the pleadings. In order to grant a motion for judgment on the pleadings, it must be apparent that there are no issues of material fact and that only questions of law exist. Britamco Underwriters v. C.J.H. Inc., 845 F.Supp. 1090, 1092 (E.D.Pa. 1994), aff'd, 37 F.2d 1485 (3d Cir. 1994); Cardio-Medical Assoc. v. Crozer-Chester Medical Ctr., 536 F.Supp. 1065 (E.D.Pa. 1982); 5A Charles A. Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 1367 at 509-10 (1990). A court is required to “view the facts presented in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party” (Society Hill Civic Ass’n v. Harris, 632 F.2d 1045, 1054 (3d Cir.1980)) and accept all reasonable inferences therefrom. Hayes v. Community General Osteopathic Hosp., 730 F.Supp. 1333 (M.D.Pa.1990), aff'd, 940 F.2d 54 (3d Cir. 1991), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 112 S.Ct. 940, 117 L.Ed.2d 110 (1992); Britamco, 845 F.Supp. at 1092.

COUNT III

Count III is a claim against Methodist alleging that Methodist failed to obtain Cor-[72]*72rigan’s informed consent to the use of the Acromed devices. Methodist argues that this count cannot stand because, under Pennsylvania law, only treating physicians and surgeons have a duty to obtain informed consent from patients. Accordingly, it argues that there is no cause of action against it, a hospital. Corrigan disagrees and argues that there are three exceptions to this general rule and that under each of those three exceptions, Methodist had an obligation to obtain her informed consent before surgery.

Pennsylvania law on the general issue of informed consent is well established. Hurley v. Won, 9 Pa.D. & C.3d 796 (C.P. 1979). Pennsylvania requires every doctor to receive an informed consent to surgery from every patient who is mentally and physically able to understand and consent and who is not in an emergency situation. Doe v. DyerGoode, 389 Pa.Super. 151, 566 A.2d 889 (1989), app. denied, 527 Pa. 587, 588 A.2d 509 (1990); Cooper v. Roberts, 220 Pa.Super. 260, 286 A.2d 647 (1971). The tort of failure of informed consent sounds in battery, not negligence. Moure v. Raeuchle, 529 Pa. 394, 405, 604 A.2d 1003, 1008 (1992); Gouse v. Cassel, 532 Pa. 197, 203, 615 A.2d 331, 334 (1992); Foflygen v. Zemel, 420 Pa.Super. 18, 33, 615 A.2d 1345, 1353 (1992) (citing cases), app. denied, 535 Pa. 619, 629 A.2d 1380 (1993). Because the tort is based on battery, an intentional tort, “the law imposes no duty on a hospital to obtain consent from a patient prior to an operation.” Hurley at 798; McKnight v. American Red Cross, No. 92-4038, 1994 WL 323861 at *3 (E.D.Pa. July 6, 1994); Foflygen, 420 Pa.Super. at 33, 615 A.2d at 1353 (“Under normal circumstances, only the physician who performs the operation on the patient has the duty of obtaining the patient’s informed consent”). There are, however, three exceptions to the general rule.

The first and second exceptions were developed in Friter v. Iolab Corp., 414 Pa.Super. 622, 607 A.2d 1111 (1992). In Friter, the Superior Court held that the hospital did have a duty to obtain informed consent from the plaintiff because of the special circumstances of the surgery. Mr. Friter’s doctors implanted certain lenses into Mr. Friter’s eyes without informing him that the lenses were part of an FDA regulated experiment. According to federal law, FDA regulations, and an agreement between the hospital, doctors and the FDA, the hospital was bound to obtain informed consent from any patient undergoing this experimental treatment.

First, the Superior Court held that although a “hospital ha[d] never been held liable to a patient under a theory of lack of informed consent,” this case did not arise under the traditional informed consent tort. Id. at 627, 607 A.2d at 1113. In this case, “the hospital, as a participant in a clinical investigation for the FDA, specifically assumed a duty to ensure that an informed consent was obtained by any patient participating in the study.” Id.

Second, the Court reasoned that the hospital “intended to cause patients to come in contact with a foreign substance,” which opened it up to a battery claim. Id. at 631, 607 A.2d at 1115. Later courts have construed Friter narrowly and limited it to its specific facts. Jones v. Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Med., 813 F.Supp. 1125, 1130 (E.D.Pa.1993).

The third exception upon which Corrigan relies is not based on battery but on negligence. In Thompson v. Nason Hospital, 527 Pa. 330, 591 A.2d 703 (1991), the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania established a new cause of action against hospitals based on corporate negligence. It held that “[corporate negligence is a doctrine under which the hospital is liable if it fails to uphold the proper standard of care owed the patient, which is to ensure the patient’s safety and well-being while at the hospital.” Id. at 339, 591 A.2d at 707. The Supreme Court found four areas of duty owed by a hospital:

(1) a duty to use reasonable care in the maintenance of safe and adequate facilities and equipment;

(2) a duty to select and retain only competent physicians;

(3) a duty to oversee all persons who practice medicine within its walls as to patient care; and

[73]*73(4) a duty to formulate, adopt and enforce adequate rules and policies to ensure quality care for the patients.

Id. at 339, 591 A.2d at 707 (citations omitted).

To this Court’s knowledge, only two courts have ever used Thompson to hold a hospital liable for informed consent. In 1989, our court held that under the Pennsylvania Superior Court decision later affirmed by Thompson, a claim against a hospital based on lack of informed consent would not be dismissed, because the hospital had a duty of its own to supervise its physicians. Karibjanian v. Thomas Jefferson Univ. Hosp., 717 F.Supp. 1081, 1083 (E.D.Pa.1989).

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Corrigan v. Methodist Hospital, 158 F.R.D. 70, 1994 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15619 (E.D. Pa. 1994).

158 F.R.D. 70 (Corrigan v. Methodist Hospital) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Hall v. Abbott Laboratories
N.D. Illinois, 2022
First Liberty Insurance Corp. v. MM
259 F. Supp. 3d 264 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 2017)
Gurevitz v. Piczon
42 Pa. D. & C.4th 308 (Lackawanna County Court of Common Pleas, 1999)
Morales v. Guarini
57 F. Supp. 2d 150 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 1999)
Bryant v. McCord
Court of Appeals of Tennessee, 1999
Auler v. Van Natta
686 N.E.2d 172 (Indiana Court of Appeals, 1997)
Davis v. Hoffman
972 F. Supp. 308 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 1997)