Niven v. Siqueira

• Decision Date: 21 November 1985
• Docket Number: No. 61137,61137
• Citation: 487 N.E.2d 937,94 Ill.Dec. 60,109 Ill.2d 357
• Parties: , 94 Ill.Dec. 60 Todd NIVEN et al., Appellees, v. Edir B. SIQUEIRA et al., Appellants.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

Page 937

487 N.E.2d 937

109 Ill.2d 357, 94 Ill.Dec. 60

Todd NIVEN et al., Appellees, v. Edir B. SIQUEIRA et al., Appellants.

No. 61137.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Nov. 21, 1985.

Schuyler, Roche & Zwirner, Chicago, for John E. Affeldt, M.D., President, Joint Com'n on Accreditation of Hospitals, respondent to subpoena-contemnor-appellant; Daniel M. Schuyler, Bruce K. Roberts, of counsel.

Fredric J. Entin, Miles J. Zaremski, Nancy Kotler, Lurie Sklar & Simon, Ltd., Chicago, for Northwestern Memorial Hosp.

Joseph T. McGuire, Perz, McGuire, Condon & Ridge, Kevin W. Dillon, Chicago, for appellees.

Mark D. Deaton, Daniel J. Mulvanny, Illinois Hosp. Ass'n, Naperville, for amicus curiae, Illinois Hosp. Ass'n.

MORAN, Justice:

In late 1979 plaintiffs, Todd and Thomas Niven, filed a medical malpractice action in the circuit court of Cook County against Dr. Edir B. Siqueira, Northwestern Memorial Hospital (Northwestern), and several persons associated with Northwestern's administration. On plaintiffs' application the circuit court issued a subpoena asking for certain documents in the possession of a third party, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (the Joint Commission), relating to Northwestern's accreditation. Both Northwestern and the Joint Commission moved to quash the subpoena, arguing that the subpoenaed documents were confidential and not discoverable pursuant to section 8--2101 of the Code of Civil Procedure (Ill.Rev.Stat.1983, ch. 110, par. 8-2101). (Sections 8-2101 through 8-2105 of the Code of Civil Procedure will hereinafter be referred to as the Act.) The circuit court denied the motions to quash but certified for interlocutory appeal the question of the Act's applicability to the documents in question. The Joint Commission and Northwestern filed a petition for leave to appeal to the appellate court pursuant to Supreme Court Rule 308 (87 Ill.2d R. 308) and also petitioned directly to this court pursuant to Supreme Court Rule 302(b) (94 Ill.2d R. 302(b)). Both petitions were denied.

Plaintiffs then moved to compel production of the documents. Northwestern was allowed to intervene in opposition to the motion to compel. The president of the Joint Commission, Dr. John E. Affeldt, informed the court that he would not comply with the subpoena, and the court thereupon found him in civil contempt. Dr. Affeldt was fined $10.

Dr. Affeldt, the Joint Commission, and Northwestern appealed the contempt order to the appellate court, and also petitioned directly to this court under Rule 302(b) (87 Ill.2d R. 302(b)). We granted direct appeal. The Illinois Hospital Association was allowed to participate as amicus curiae, urging that the documents in question be held to be confidential and nondiscoverable.

Appellants raise a single issue for review: Does the Act protect from discovery surveys, accreditation evaluations, and other records in the hands of the Joint Commission? Plaintiffs, on cross-appeal, raise three additional issues: (1) Does the current, amended version of the Act control this appeal, or is this appeal instead governed by the Act as it existed at the time the lawsuit was initiated? (2) Have appellants presented a record sufficient to warrant quashing the subpoena? and (3) If the Act does exempt the documents in question from discovery, does this result render the Act unconstitutional as a violation of the separation of powers?

Defendant Edir B. Siqueira, M.D., performed several operations upon the brain of plaintiff Todd Niven between 1975 and 1977, utilizing a procedure known as stereotactic brain surgery. Plaintiffs claim that Todd Niven was injured as a result of Dr. Siqueira's negligent performance of those operations. Plaintiffs also allege that defendant Northwestern and the named administrators were negligent in allowing Dr. Siqueira clinical privileges to perform stereotactic surgery. Amongst plaintiffs' specific allegations they claim that Northwestern failed to adequately review Dr. Siqueira's clinical privileges, alleging as a standard of care the Joint Commission's accreditation standards. (A cause of action against hospitals for negligent supervision of care was approved by this court in Darling v. Charleston Community Memorial Hospital (1965), 33 Ill.2d 326, 211 N.E.2d 253.)

On July 26, 1983, pursuant to their claims against Northwestern and the hospital administrators, plaintiffs caused to be served on the Joint Commission a subpoena requesting documents relating to Northwestern's accreditation. Specifically, the subpoena asked for the following materials:

"Any and all records, documents and other papers and instruments of writing regarding or relating to McGraw [sic ] Medical Center, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago, Illinois for the years 1972 through 1982, inclusive of the followings [sic ]:

a) Any and all applications for survey hospital [sic ], survey profiles, all annual surveys for each service category[,] all survey reports[,] recommendations and reports, all reports of [the] Joint Commission and all hospital surveyor reports and records.

b) Any and all documents reflecting or regarding accreditation history of Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

c) All information given and presented to on site surveyors and field representatives and all summations [sic ] conferences, public hearings and public information hearings.

d) All self surveys and reports given by Northwestern Memorial during the interim years.

e) All official records and reports of publically [sic ] recognized licensing[,] examining[,] review and planning bodies obtained by Joint Commission or [sic ] Accreditation of Hospitals regarding Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

f) Any and all other documents, records and other papers and instruments of writing regarding or relating to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago, Illinois."

Northwestern and the Joint Commission filed motions to quash the subpoena, citing the Act. Section 8-2101 of the Act currently reads as follows:

"Information obtained. All information, interviews, reports, statements, memoranda or other data of the Illinois Department of Public Health, the Illinois Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities, Illinois State Medical Society, allied medical societies, physician-owned inter-insurance exchanges and their agents, or committees of licensed or accredited hospitals or their medical staffs, including Patient Care Audit Committees, Medical Care Evaluation Committees, Utilization Review Committees, Credential Committees and Executive Committees, (but not the medical records pertaining to the patient), used in the course of internal quality control or of medical study for the purpose of reducing morbidity or mortality, or for improving patient care, shall be privileged, strictly confidential and shall be used only for medical research, the evaluation and improvement of quality care, or granting, limiting or revoking staff privileges, except that in any hospital proceeding to decide upon a physician's staff privileges, or in any judicial review thereof, the claim of confidentiality shall not be invoked to deny such physician access to or use of data upon which such a decision was based." (Ill.Rev.Stat.1984 Supp., ch. 110, par. 8-2101.)

In addition, section 8-2102 specifically makes such information nondiscoverable:

"Admissibility as evidence. Such information, records, reports, statements, notes, memoranda or other data shall not be admissible as evidence, nor discoverable in any action of any kind in any court or before any tribunal, board, agency or person." Ill.Rev.Stat.1983, ch. 110, par. 8-2102.

Appellants placed into the record the Joint Commission's Accreditation Manual for Hospitals, which describes the purposes of the Joint Commission and the procedures it follows. According to the Accreditation Manual, the Joint Commission is the sole organization which accredits entire hospitals. It is governed by a committee of delegates selected by the American Medical Association, the American Dental Association, the American Hospital Association, the American College of Surgeons, and the American College of Physicians. Its basic purposes are to establish standards for the operation of health care facilities, to conduct survey and accreditation programs that encourage and assist health care facilities in the task of promoting efficient, high quality patient care, and to recognize compliance with their standards by issuance of certificates of accreditation. The Joint Commission's standards and accreditation programs are concerned with all aspects of hospital operation.

In surveying a hospital which has applied for accreditation the Joint Commission conducts an on-site survey, interviews employees, physicians, and patients of the hospital, and examines the hospital's records and files, including materials specifically protected by the Act. The survey team's report includes recommendations for improvements. A hospital's accreditation status depends in part upon the hospital's progress in remedying identified deficiencies.

Initially we address the question of which version of the Act applies to this litigation. Prior to July 13, 1982--including at the time the case at bar was originally filed--the statute provided only that the stated information was strictly confidential and nonadmissible, but did not specifically provide that the information was privileged or nondiscoverable. (See Ill.Rev.Stat.1979, ch. 51, pars. 101, 102; now Ill.Rev.Stat.1983, ch. 110, pars. 8-2101, 8-2102.) Plaintiffs argue that under the Act, as it existed at the time their suit was initiated, even confidential material is nonetheless subject to discovery. We need not determine whether this is so, since it is our view that the current version of the Act governs this appeal.

A new law which affects only procedure generally applies to litigation pending when the law takes effect. (Maiter v. Chicago Board of Education (1980), 82...