McDaniel v. General Care Corp.

627 S.W.2d 129, 1981 Tenn. App. LEXIS 523
CourtCourt of Appeals of Tennessee
DecidedJune 30, 1981
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 627 S.W.2d 129 (McDaniel v. General Care Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Tennessee primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
McDaniel v. General Care Corp., 627 S.W.2d 129, 1981 Tenn. App. LEXIS 523 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1981).

Opinions

OPINION

SANDERS, Judge.

The issues on this appeal involve the application of T.C.A. § 23-3409 and 29-26-119 of the Medical Malpractice Statutes.

The Plaintiff-Appellee, Sue L. McDaniel, sued the Defendants-Appellants, General Care Corporation and Christine W. Bersin, for medical malpractice. In her complaint she alleges that General Care Corporation operates Park West Hospital which provides facilities for the care and treatment of the sick and injured. Defendant Christine Ber-sin is a registered nurse and was employed by the hospital and practiced her profession there. The Plaintiff was admitted to the hospital for the purpose of undergoing surgery. On the night before surgery Defendant Bersin gave the Plaintiff an injection of Thorazine subcutaneously in the area of her left hip. Subsequent to this injection the Plaintiff developed a grotesque lesion in her left hip requiring extensive medical treatment and surgery. The Defendants failed to properly administer the injection. The negligence of the Defendants resulted in the Plaintiff’s sustaining disabling and disfiguring injuries to her hip, causing great pain and mental anguish. As a result of her injuries she had loss of wages and doctors’, hospital and medical expenses. The Plaintiff, David A. McDaniel, husband of the Plaintiff, joined in the complaint seeking to recover medical expenses and loss of consortium.

The Defendants, for answer, denied they were guilty of any negligence or any failure to properly treat the Plaintiff. They said their care and treatment of the Plaintiff was well within standards of care for hospitals and nurses of the community.

The case was tried before a jury which found the issues in favor of the Plaintiff, Sue McDaniel, and fixed her damages at $55,000.

The Defendants’ motion for a new trial was overruled and they have appealed.

Before the case was tried it had been referred to a medical malpractice review board and that board had filed a majority report and a minority report. The majority report found the Plaintiff’s claim “with merit” and the minority report found the claim “without merit.”

Upon the trial of the case the court permitted counsel for the Plaintiffs to read the majority report to the jury but would not permit counsel for the Defendants to read the minority report. The Defendants insist this was error, and we agree.

T.C.A. § 23-3409, which was in effect at the time of the trial, provides, as pertinent here, as follows:

“The board shall prepare a formal statement of its recommendations. If a minority number of the board members do not agree with the statement and recommendations of the majority, a minority statement may be prepared which shall be identified as such.
“The formal statement of the board and the minority statement, if any, shall be admissible at a subsequent trial as an exception to the hearsay rule. The formal statement of recommendations of the board or the minority statement shall in-[131]*131elude, but not be limited to, (1) the standard of conduct applied; (2) the alleged deviation from such standard; and (3) findings and conclusions.”

The majority report provides: “This cause came on to be heard before the Medical Malpractice Review Board, in the Eastern Grand Division, Knoxville, Tennessee, upon the 8th day of February, 1980, upon notice of claim filed by plaintiff, the responsive answer by the defendant, the oral testimony of witnesses examined before the Review Board and upon the record as a whole, from all of which it appeared to the Board that the claim is with merit.

“The standard of Care of nurses giving shots of thorazine require that the nurse give the shot in the gluteus muscle.

“The deviation from such standard was the fact of giving a shot of thorozine in subcutaneous tissue rather than in the muscle.

“We find that defendant nurse Bersin gave a shot of thorazine to the plaintiff at the time alleged in subcutaneous.”

The minority report provides: “This cause came on to be heard before the Medical Malpractice Review Board, in the Eastern Grand Division, Knoxville, Tennessee, upon the 8th day of February, 1980. Upon notice of claim filed by plaintiff, the responsive answer by the defendant, the oral testimony of witnesses examined before the Review Board and upon the record as a whole, from all of which it appeared to the Board that the claim is without merit.

“The Following Report by Robert W. Trotter, M.D.

“I feel there is insufficient proof that the single injection of thorazine by one nurse, Christine Bersin, could have caused this patient’s sterile abscess or entity. The injection was given properly and not in the site of the ‘knot’ or bruise. I feel the patient had excellent physicians, and nurses and that there was no abnormal or wrong procedures done. The pathologist has attested that the patient’s problem was caused by the thorazine injection. However, I can see no definite proof that one shot by one nurse caused this problem and must emphasize this.

“The Following Report by Rick Edwards, R.N.

“It is of my opinion that Mrs. Sue McDaniel has no merit to consider in this case. I am not convinced that the one injection of thorazine in question can be considered as the sole originator of the plaintiff’s problem. Doctors questioned voiced ‘reasonable medical proof’ that the excoriation could have been caused by a subcuteaneous injection specifically addressing the thorazine but not considering other injections given by other nurses. In my opinion, Ms. Bersin exercised appropriate standard of care. She had the correct medication, the correct length of needle, the correct patient and the correct site for injection. Ms. Bersin noticed a bruised area that had knots present when preparing to give the injection. She exercised good nursing judgment by avoiding that specific area for injection of the thorazine and chose an area soft and clear of discoloration for her injection site. Multiple injections were given by other nurses subsequent to the thorazine injection in question. It is of my opinion that this one injection of thorazine can not be named as the specific cause of the problem with Mrs. McDaniel’s hip.”

It is not clear why the court refused to permit the Defendants to read the minority report, in light of the statute. In making his ruling the following colloquy transpired between the court and counsel for the Defendants:

“MR. BUTLER: Your Honor, there is a majority report and a minority report and he wants to read the majority report and doesn’t want me to read the minority report.

“THE COURT: That’s right. I don’t think the minority report has anything to do with it; just what their findings are.

“MR. BUTLER: Your Honor, it’s a five-member board, it was a three-two decision—

“THE COURT: I don’t care what it was. The minority has nothing to do with the [132]*132opinion. In other words, that is what the act says that he may read the result of the recommendation of the board and that is it.

“MR. BUTLER: This is the recommendation of the board.

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

Related

Harless v. Kingsport
Court of Appeals of Tennessee, 1998
In re: The Adoption of female child, E.N.R.
Court of Appeals of Tennessee, 1993

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
627 S.W.2d 129, 1981 Tenn. App. LEXIS 523, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mcdaniel-v-general-care-corp-tennctapp-1981.