Physicians & Surgeons General Hospital v. Koblizek

752 S.W.2d 657, 1988 Tex. App. LEXIS 1217, 1988 WL 53011
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMay 26, 1988
Docket13-87-165-CV
StatusPublished
Cited by32 cases

This text of 752 S.W.2d 657 (Physicians & Surgeons General Hospital v. Koblizek) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Physicians & Surgeons General Hospital v. Koblizek, 752 S.W.2d 657, 1988 Tex. App. LEXIS 1217, 1988 WL 53011 (Tex. Ct. App. 1988).

Opinion

*658 OPINION

BENAVIDES, Justice.

This is an appeal from a jury verdict in favor of the appellees, Dorothy and George Koblizek. Dorothy Koblizek alleged that, while at appellant hospital, she slipped and fell at a point where two different floor surfaces met. The case was submitted to the jury on a general negligence charge, and the jury awarded appellee damages. The trial court entered judgment in favor of the Koblizeks for $151,887.30. On appeal, the hospital raises points concerning the correctness of the submission of the trial court’s charge to the jury and the sufficiency of the evidence to support the verdict. We reverse and render.

A brief summary of the conflicting and inconsistent evidence surrounding Dorothy Koblizek’s fall is necessary to appreciate the context in which the requested issues, instructions and objections to the court’s charge were presented prior to the submission of the case to the jury.

The evidence reveals that Dorothy Kobli-zek suffered from diabetes at the time of her fall at the hospital. She also suffered from a related condition called “drop foot,” which caused her to lose feeling in her feet. She fell in a commonly used area of the hospital. There was disputed evidence of exactly how and where she fell. George Koblizek, Dorothy’s husband, testified that he went back to the hospital after his wife’s fall and discovered the point where the different floor surfaces met. He thought that was where the accident happened. Appellee Dorothy Koblizek testified that she tripped and fell backward, injuring her hip. She did not see what she fell on. She did not testify at trial that her leg was numb before the fall. She consistently claimed that she tripped on something. James Flanagan, an expert engineer hired by the Koblizeks, testified that he examined the area where the floor surfaces came together and determined that the coefficients of friction were different between the asphalt and terrazzo surfaces. The difference in the surfaces was about one-sixteenth of an inch. He believed this created a dangerous condition and that ap-pellee could have fallen as a result of the differing surfaces.

Robert Trevino, a maintenance foreman at the hospital, testified that he saw appel-lee fall. He testified that she did not fall at the point where the floor surfaces met. Margit Alaniz, another hospital employee, testified that she also saw Dorothy fall. She checked the floors and determined that they were dry at the time of the fall, and that there was nothing wrong with the floor surface. She had worked at the hospital for twenty years and knew of no problems with the differing floor surfaces. She believed appellee tripped on her cane, but appellee and her husband denied that she used a cane on the day of the accident. Judith Stuckey, a registered nurse at the hospital, testified that appellee told her after the accident that her leg had gone numb. She did not see anything on the floor which could have caused the accident.

The hospital’s first five points of error concern whether the trial court erred in submitting this slip and fall case to the jury based upon general negligence principles rather than the method of submission set forth in Hernandez v. Kroger Co., 711 S.W.2d 3 (Tex.1986), and Corbin v. Safeway Stores, Inc., 648 S.W.2d 292 (Tex.1983). The hospital claims the trial court failed to submit to the jury the issues of whether the condition of the floor presented an unreasonable risk of harm and whether the hospital knew or should have known of the risk. The hospital argues that these were essential elements of appel-lees’ case. The Koblizeks argue that the trial court correctly submitted the charge to the jury, claiming that Corbin and Hernandez are not on point because those cases involve dangers resulting from transitional foreign substances, while the instant case involved a static, created condition.

A possessor of land is subject to liability for physical harm occurring on the land if he: (1) knows or by the exercise of reasonable care should discover the dangerous condition, and should realize that it involves an unreasonable risk of harm to invitees, and (2) should expect that the invi *659 tees will not discover or realize the danger, or will fail to protect themselves against it, and (3) fails to exercise reasonable care to protect the invitees against the danger. Corbin, 648 S.W.2d at 295. As an invitee, a plaintiff must prove:

1) the possessor had actual or constructive knowledge of some condition on the premises;
2) the condition posed an unreasonable risk of harm to invitees;
3) the possessor failed to exercise reasonable care to reduce or eliminate the risk; and
4) the possessor’s failure to use such care proximately caused the injuries.

Id. at 296. The Supreme Court reaffirmed the Corbin elements of a slip and fall case in Hernandez v. Kroger Co., 711 S.W.2d at 4.

Here, the Court submitted special issues to the jury which inquired whether it was negligent for appellant to allow there to be different surface levels between the waxed asphalt tile and terrazzo tile surfaces separating the bathroom hallway and lobby area and whether such negligence was the proximate cause of the occurrence. Appellant objected to the court’s submission of these issues and requested additional issues and instructions to be submitted to the jury. The first requested issue inquired:

Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that on the occasion in question the hospital floor presented an unreasonable risk of harm?

This issue was accompanied by the following instruction:

You are instructed that a condition presenting an unreasonable risk of harm is one in which there is a sufficient probability of a harmful event occurring that a reasonably prudent person would have foreseen that it or some similar event would be likely to occur.

The second requested issue, predicated upon an affirmative finding to the above requested issue, was as follows:

Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that on the occasion in question Physicians and Surgeons Hospital knew or by the exercise of ordinary care should have discovered that the hospital floor presented an unreasonable risk of harm.

The Koblizeks argue that the recent premises liability cases involving construction sites have been submitted on general negligence principles without regard to a special finding of unreasonable risk of harm. They cite the cases of Tovar v. Amarillo Oil Co., 692 S.W.2d 469 (Tex.1985) and Redinger v. Living, Inc., 689 S.W.2d 415 (Tex.1985), as support. Both of these cases are inapposite. First, Tovar

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Bluebook (online)
752 S.W.2d 657, 1988 Tex. App. LEXIS 1217, 1988 WL 53011, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/physicians-surgeons-general-hospital-v-koblizek-texapp-1988.