Rivenes v. Holden

257 S.W.3d 332, 2008 WL 1991528
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJune 26, 2008
Docket14-07-00438-CV
StatusPublished
Cited by72 cases

This text of 257 S.W.3d 332 (Rivenes v. Holden) 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
Rivenes v. Holden, 257 S.W.3d 332, 2008 WL 1991528 (Tex. Ct. App. 2008).

Opinion

SUBSTITUTE OPINION

WANDA McKEE FOWLER, Justice.

On the Holdens’ motion for rehearing, we withdraw our March 11, 2008 opinion and judgment, substitute the following, and overrule the motion for rehearing. Our holding remains unchanged.

Appellant, Scott Rivenes, M.D., appeals from the trial court’s denial of his motion to dismiss the claims of appellees, Donald M. Holden and Mary Holden, for failure to comply with section 74.351 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code requiring a plaintiff suing a doctor to file an expert report. In two issues, appellant contends that the trial court abused its discretion when it (1) denied his motion to dismiss; and (2) granted the Holdens a 90-day extension to amend or supplement the medi *334 cal expert report completed by Dr. Robert Lamberg. We agree with appellant that the expert report the Holdens filed was not a report as to appellant because it neither mentioned him nor addressed his alleged acts of negligence. As a result, we (1) conclude that the trial court abused its discretion in denying appellant’s motion to dismiss; (2) reverse the judgment of the trial court; (3) render judgment dismissing the Holdens’ claims against appellant with prejudice; and (4) remand the case for a determination of reasonable attorney’s fees and court costs.

Factual and Procedural Background

According to the parties’ pleadings, on June 13, 2004, at approximately 7:00 p.m., Donald Holden (“Holden”) suddenly lost vision in his left eye. He was rushed to the emergency room of Methodist Sugar Land Hospital (“the Hospital”), where he was examined by appellant at approximately 7:15 p.m. Appellant diagnosed Holden with a central retinal artery occlusion, and referred him to Dr. Matthew McMenemy (“McMenemy”), the ophthalmologist on call at the Hospital that night. However, McMenemy did not see Holden until 8:30 p.m., and at 10:30 p.m. prescribed him Retavase. Unfortunately, Holden permanently lost complete vision in his left eye.

On August 25, 2006, Holden and his wife, Mary Holden, (“the Holdens”) filed suit against McMenemy, appellant, and the Hospital, 1 asserting causes of action for medical malpractice and negligence. On December 19, 2006, the Holdens timely served the parties with the medical expert report and curriculum vitae of Dr. Robert Lamberg (“Lamberg”). Lamberg’s one and one-half page report contained the following facts and opinions:

I have read the documents forwarded to me in regard to the complaint of your client, Donald Holden, in regard to Dr. Mathew McMenemy and Methodist Sugar Land Hospital.
Mr. Holden says that at 6:45 p.m. on June 13, 2004, he suddenly lost the vision in his left eye and called the emergency room which told him to come to the hospital right away. He arrived at the hospital at 7:15 p.m. He was seen in the emergency room with light perception vision. A diagnosis of central retinal artery occlusion (CRAO) was made, and he was admitted to the hospital. He was seen in Dr. Menemy’s office about 8:30 that evening, and a decision to try to lyse the occlusion with Reta-vase was made. About 10:30 p.m. the patient received the Retavase, but there was no improvement in the vision.
The following day in the hospital, the patient received a large number of tests to try to determine the etiology of the CRAO. The right carotid artery was relatively clean but the left carotid artery was 40-50% occluded. The sed rate and other tests were non-contributory. The patient was discharged on aspirin, Plavix, Lisinopril, and Zocor.
It was imperative from the outset to do first aid for central retinal artery occlusion. Some or all of the following could have been done by the emergency room staff and/or Dr. McMenemy: manually massage the eye to try and break up the clot, breathe into a paper bag to try to dilate the retinal artery with increased C02 in the blood, topical beta blocker drops and/or Diamox IV to lower the pressure in the eye, and/or a paracentes-is of the eye to immediately lower the pressure in the eye.
The office notes from Dr. McMenemy only include a page that is dated 6/13/06.
*335 This is very disturbing, as the incident occurred on 6/13/04 and no other notes were obtained from the office with a request for records. One must wonder if this note was altered or constructed at a later date. I only received one page of written notes. There is no mention of any treatment, impression or plan noted on this page.
There were no attempts made to resuscitate the stroke in the blind eye other tha[n] the Retavase. If the occlusion were a cholesterol plaque and not a clot, the Retavase would not be expected to work.
It is my opinion that the emergency room and Dr. McMenemy failed to provide the standard of care for the catastrophic central retinal artery occlusion that presented within 2 hour of the event. While the outcome of CRAO is variable, even when all the above steps are taken, there is still a significant percentage of eyes that recuperate some level of useful vision even 24 hours after an artery occlusion.

The Holdens did not serve upon the parties any further expert reports before the expiration of the 120-day deadline imposed by section 74.351(a) of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code.

Pursuant to section 74.351(a), appellant had until January 9, 2007, to file and serve any objections to the sufficiency of Lam-berg’s expert report. On January 11, 2007, appellant filed objections to that report, accompanied by a motion to dismiss. Appellant objected on the basis that Lam-berg, an ophthalmologist, was not qualified to render an expert opinion regarding the standard of care expected of appellant, an emergency room physician. Appellant further objected that Lamberg’s report failed to mention appellant by name, thereby failing to notify him of the specific conduct forming the basis of the Holdens’ claims, and precluding the trial court from evaluating the merits of those claims. However, appellant subsequently withdrew those objections and the motion to dismiss on January 18, 2007.

On January 31, 2007, appellant filed a second motion to dismiss the Holdens’ claims. In this motion to dismiss, appellant asserted that section 74.351 required the Holdens to file an expert report by December 23, 2006 addressing appellant’s alleged negligence, and, if no report was filed, the Holdens’ claims against appellant must be dismissed. 2 Appellant contended that Lamberg’s expert report addressed solely the alleged negligence of the other defendants, and because no other expert report was served upon appellant by the expiration of the 120-day deadline, section 74.351(b) mandated dismissal of the claims against appellant with prejudice. Appellant also sought the recovery of reasonable attorney’s fees and court costs. The trial court denied appellant’s motion to dismiss. The court also granted appellant an additional 21 days to object to the sufficiency of Lamberg’s expert report, and further granted the Holdens an additional 90 days to amend Lamberg’s expert report and/or supplement his report with that of an emergency medicine physician.

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

Related

James Rinkle M.D. v. William Graf & Linda Graf
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2022
Careflite and Nathan Taton v. Jerold Taylor
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2019
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston v. Joplin
525 S.W.3d 772 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2017)
Post Acute Medical, LLC v. Montgomery
514 S.W.3d 889 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2017)
Cedar Senior Services v. Nevarez
429 S.W.3d 723 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2014)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
257 S.W.3d 332, 2008 WL 1991528, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rivenes-v-holden-texapp-2008.