Bhatnagar v. Mid-Maine Medical Center, MID-MAINE

• Decision Date: 27 May 1986
• Docket Number: MID-MAINE
• Citation: 510 A.2d 233
• Parties: Hemendra N. BHATNAGAR v.MEDICAL CENTER.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 233

510 A.2d 233

Hemendra N. BHATNAGAR v. MID-MAINE MEDICAL CENTER.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued Jan. 7, 1986.

Decided May 27, 1986.

Augustine & Kern Ltd., Alan Rhine (orally), Chicago, Ill., Stephen T. Hayes, Augusta, for plaintiff.

Marden, Dubord, Bernier & Stevens, Albert Bernier (orally), Waterville, for defendant.

Before McKUSICK, C.J., and NICHOLS, ROBERTS, GLASSMAN and SCOLNIK, JJ.

NICHOLS, Justice.

Hemendra N. Bhatnagar, the Plaintiff physician, appeals from two orders of the Superior Court (Kennebec County), one denying in part his motion to amend the complaint and the other granting Defendant Mid-Maine Medical Center's motion for summary judgment. He contends that summary judgment for the Defendant was improper because he had demonstrated that genuine issues of material fact existed concerning his claim that the Medical Center had violated its own by-laws. He further assigns error to the Superior Court's refusal to grant him leave to amend the complaint to include allegations that his constitutional right to due process had been violated.

We affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.

The Plaintiff is a licensed Maine physician, first appointed to the Medical Center's staff in June, 1975, when he received clinical privileges in otolaryngology. He was reappointed in each of the years 1976, 1977 and 1978. The Defendant is a private, non-profit Maine corporation located in Waterville and served by a 27-member Board of Trustees.

The event precipitating this litigation occurred on August 31, 1978, when the Executive Committee of the medical staff, at a regular monthly meeting, voted summarily to suspend the Plaintiff's clinical privileges. In a letter written the next day the Executive Committee asserted that the Plaintiff had refused to undertake an emergency room case, in violation of the Medical Staff Rules and Regulations. Pursuant to the Rules, an Ad Hoc Hearing Committee took up the matter on October 4, 1978, and found that the Plaintiff's refusal to take the emergency room case was not a sufficient reason for summary suspension. Accordingly, it recommended that the physician be reinstated onto the medical staff, this reinstatement being contingent upon his adherence to the Rules.

As the Plaintiff's 1978 staff appointment neared its expiration in March, 1979, ¹ the Executive Committee recommended reappointment with the proviso that approval be "subject to the final review" of the Board of Trustees. The Board, however, voted that same day not to reappoint the Plaintiff. On March 27, 1979, a Joint Conference Committee met, reviewed the Executive Committee's recommendation, and concurred with the Board. On April 26, 1979, the Board reaffirmed its decision and so notified the Plaintiff in a letter that detailed some 26 charges of misconduct dating back to 1963. On October 8, 1980, another Ad Hoc Committee, after lengthy hearings, dismissed seven of the 26 charges but concluded that the other 19 charges, as a whole, supported the Board's decision not to reappoint the Plaintiff.

The Plaintiff seasonably requested appellate review. On December 22, 1980, the Appellate Review Committee upheld the Board, finding that the Board's decision "was justified and was neither arbitrary nor capricious." The Joint Conference Committee met again on January 19, 1981, and reaffirmed the Board's original decision. Finally, on January 26, 1981, two years and four months after the Executive Committee's September 1, 1978, letter, the Board reaffirmed its original decision, refusing to reappoint the Plaintiff to the medical staff.

The Plaintiff did not wait until the Board's final decision, however, before filing a complaint in Superior Court on September 2, 1980. On May 29, 1984, that court denied the Plaintiff's motion to amend his complaint. The Defendant's motion for summary judgment was granted on June 25, 1985, after which the Plaintiff brought this appeal.

Summary judgment is proper when there is no genuine issue as to a material fact and a party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. M.R.Civ.P. 56(c). Here the Superior Court found that the relevant facts were not in dispute.

The Plaintiff is correct in asserting that the by-laws of a private association, such as the Medical Center, constitute an enforceable contract between him and that association. We so held in Gashgai v. Maine Medical Association, 350 A.2d 571, 572 (Me.1976). In Superior Court the Plaintiff claimed that in refusing to reappoint him to the staff the Medical Center had violated its own by-laws, thereby committing a breach of its contract with him. The Superior Court entered summary judgment for the Defendant on that claim of by-law violation, finding that it presented no genuine issue of material fact. On appeal the Plaintiff contests that finding, arguing that the Medical Center committed a breach of its own by-laws (1) by considering earlier charges of which he had been cleared and (2) by holding an unauthorized meeting of the Joint Conference Committee. We reject this argument, agreeing with the Superior Court that the Defendant "is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law." M.R.Civ.P. 56(e).

The Plaintiff first argues that summary judgment was improper because there is a factual issue whether the Defendant's by-laws permit it to assert charges predating the September 1, 1978, letter. His contention is that the Ad Hoc Committee's report following the initial complaint cleared him of charges in that complaint as well as all earlier charges; thus, by raising the earlier charges, the Defendant violated its by-laws. Contrary to his argument, however, there is nothing in the by-laws that, after the termination of a staff physician's summary suspension and his reinstatement to the medical staff, forecloses the Medical Center from investigating earlier charges of misconduct.

The Defendant's by-laws confer upon its Board of Trustees wide discretion in considering medical...