Acadiana Renal Physicians v. Our Lady of Lourdes Reg'l Med. Ctr.

• Decision Date: 04 October 2021
• Docket Number: 21-586
• Parties: ACADIANA RENAL PHYSICIANS, A MEDICAL CORPORATION, ET AL. v. OUR LADY OF LOURDES REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER, INC. AND LAFAYETTE GENERAL MEDICAL CENTER, INC.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US

ACADIANA RENAL PHYSICIANS, A MEDICAL CORPORATION, ET AL.
v.
OUR LADY OF LOURDES REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER, INC. AND LAFAYETTE GENERAL MEDICAL CENTER, INC.

No. 21-586

Court of Appeals of Louisiana, Third Circuit

October 4, 2021

ON APPEAL FROM THE FIFTEENTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT PARISH OF LAFAYETTE, NO. 20202289 HONORABLE THOMAS R. DUPLANTIER, DISTRICT JUDGE

Adam G. Young

John Alden Meade

Meade Young, LLC

COUNSEL FOR PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS:

Acadiana Renal Physicians, A Medical Corporation and Drs. Anthony Blalock, Roderick Clark, Akshey Gupta, Melissa Harrington, Maximo Lamarche, Alphonso Lebron, and Juan Zeik

Russell B. Kahn

Attorney at Law

COUNSEL FOR PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS:

Acadiana Renal Physicians, A Medical Corporation and Drs. Anthony Blalock, Roderick Clark, Akshey Gupta, Melissa Harrington, Maximo Lamarche, Alphonso Lebron, and Juan Zeik

Randall Kurt Theunissen

Laura P. Johnson

Allen & Gooch

COUNSEL FOR DEFENDANT-APPELLEE:

Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center, Inc.

James H. Gibson

Stacy N. Kennedy

Gibson Law Partners, L.L.C.

COUNSEL FOR DEFENDANT-APPELLEE:

Lafayette General Medical Center, Inc.

Charles E. Leche

Deutsch Kerrigan, LLP

COUNSEL FOR:

Certain Underwriters At Lloyds

Jaylen Hebert Simar

Julie Savoy

Gachassin Law Firm

COUNSEL FOR:

St. Tammany Parish Service District No. 1, d/b/a St. Tammany Parish Hospital Service District No. 1

M. Bofill Duhe

District Attorney, Iberia Parish

S. Andrew Shealy

Assistant District Attorney

Iberia Parish Courthouse

COUNSEL FOR:

Iberia Medical Center Foundation

Court composed of Elizabeth A. Pickett, Billy H. Ezell, and Jonathan W. Perry, Judges.

JONATHAN W. PERRY JUDGE

Acadiana Renal Physicians, A.M.C. ("ARP") and its members, Drs. Anthony Blalock, Roderick Clark, Akshey Gupta, Melissa Harrington, Maximo Lamarche, Alphonso Lebron, and Juan Zeik, (collectively "the Plaintiff Doctors"), appeal the judgment of the trial court that denied the motion to compel Our Lady of Lourdes Regional Medical Center, Inc. ("OLOL") and Lafayette General Medical Center, Inc. ("LGMC") to answer Supplemental Discovery Requests.

STATEMENT OF FACTS

ARP sued OLOL and LGMC alleging violations of the Louisiana Monopolies Act, La.R.S. 51:121-152, the Louisiana Unfair Trade Practices Act ("LUTPA"), La.R.S. 51:1401-1428, and seeking damages for unjust enrichment. At issue is the failure of OLOL and LGMC to pay the nephrologists, all of whom are members of the medical staffs of OLOL and LGMC with full medical privileges, for emergency on-call compensation they render at the two hospitals and other hospitals those two medical systems own. The petition alleges that the hospitals exercise their monopsony power to deny on-call payments to nephrologists at either hospital. The petition alleges that other physician specialists receive on-call pay in Lafayette, and other localities pay nephrologists on-call pay. After the trial court granted an exception of vagueness, ARP filed an amended petition which added the seven doctors who are shareholders in ARP as plaintiffs (collectively "the Plaintiffs").

On February 1, 2021, the trial court denied the peremptory exception of no cause of action brought by OLOL and LGMC. However, the trial court granted the peremptory exception of OLOL and LGMC finding no right of action against ARP and further granted the motion to strike brought by OLOL and LGMC, striking two paragraphs of the petition. On appeal to this court, we reversed the trial court's judgment which had granted the peremptory exception of no right of action and further granted the motion to strike and remanded the matter to the trial court for further proceedings. Acadiana Renal Physicians, A Med. Corp. v. Our Lady of Lourdes Reg'l Med. Ctr., Inc., 21-289, 21-290 (La.App. 3 Cir. 5/27/21), 321 So.3d 469.^[1]

As it pertains to this appeal, on February 15, 2021, the Plaintiff Doctors served OLOL and LGMC with identical written supplemental discovery requests.^[2] Those discovery requests included three interrogatories and two requests for production of documents, as follows:

Interrogatories

Supplemental Interrogatory No. 1.

Identify each physician who received compensation remuneration, or other consideration for providing emergency call services to any emergency department maintained by You from 2016 to the present. (In the event such compensation etc. was received by a physician practice group business entity, e.g., a medical corporation or a limited liability company, please identify that business entity and the physicians linked to that business entity.)

Supplemental Interrogatory No. 2.

For each physician and business entity identified in response to Supplemental Interrogatory No. 1, above, identify the amount [of] compensation, remuneration, or other consideration received by such physician or business entity by date and payment

Supplemental Interrogatory No. 3.

For each physician and business entity identified in response to Supplemental Interrogatory No. 1, above, please describe in detail how You determined the amount of compensation, remuneration, or other consideration paid to them.

Requests for Production

Supplemental Request for Production No. 1.

All documents, communications, and ESI relating to or concerning the compensation, remuneration, or other consideration received by such physician or business entities as indicated in Your response to Supplemental Interrogatory No. 2.

Supplemental Request for Production No. 2.

All documents, communications, and ESI relating to or concerning how You determined the amount of compensation, remuneration, or other consideration paid as indicated in Your response to Supplemental Interrogatory No. 3.

Subsequently, in individual responses OLOL and LGMC objected to those supplemental interrogatories and requests for production. Their objections consisted of three basic parts^[3]: (1) providing the information would violate the privacy rights of the physicians whose compensation would be disclosed and were confidential;^[4] (2) the information sought is proprietary; and (3) the information sought is irrelevant.

On April 12, 2021, the Plaintiff Doctors filed a motion to compel discovery from OLOL and LGMC. This matter was heard on May 24, 2021 and denied by the trial court as being premature because a Rule 10.1 Conference had not been conducted.

After conducting 10.1 Conferences on June 2 and 7, 2021, the Plaintiffs^[5]refiled their motion to compel, and a hearing was held on July 12, 2021. Most of this hearing was spent on what the trial court thought it had ruled at the hearing on May 24, 2021, on these same issues. After hearing oral argument, the trial court ultimately denied the Plaintiffs' motion to compel. The Plaintiffs^[6] then perfected this expedited appeal under the provisions of La.R.S. 51:135.

The Plaintiffs sole assignment of error is that the trial court abused its discretion...