Bleiler v. Bodnar

• Decision Date: 02 May 1985
• Parties: , 479 N.E.2d 230 James H. BLEILER, Sr., et al., Respondents, v. Roman BODNAR et al., Defendants; Tioga General Hospital, Appellant.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 885

489 N.Y.S.2d 885

65 N.Y.2d 65, 479 N.E.2d 230

James H. BLEILER, Sr., et al., Respondents, v. Roman BODNAR et al., Defendants Tioga General Hospital, Appellant.

Court of Appeals of New York.

May 2, 1985.

Roy E. Pomerantz, Kenneth S. Fiorella, New York City, and Alvin P. Bluthman, Brooklyn, for appellant.

Cyril A. Krenzer, Buffalo, for respondents.

OPINION OF THE COURT

KAYE, Judge.

A claim against a hospital for the negligence of its medical personnel in treating a patient is governed by the Statute of Limitations for medical malpractice, as is a direct cause of action against the doctor and the nurse. However, a claim that the hospital failed to provide competent personnel or to promulgate appropriate emergency room rules sounds in negligence, and is subject to the three-year limitations period (CPLR 214), rather than the shorter medical malpractice limitations period (CPLR 214-a).

I

On October 9, 1980, plaintiff James Bleiler visited the emergency room of Tioga General Hospital in Waverly, New York, seeking treatment for an eye injury he had suffered at work the day before. An unidentified nurse, denominated "Jane Doe" in the complaint, took Bleiler's medical history, after which he was examined and treated by Dr. Roman Bodnar, an emergency room physician. Bodnar, apparently failing to detect a metal fragment in Bleiler's right eye, directed him to apply an ointment and wear an eyepatch for three days. If pain and redness persisted, Bleiler was to seek further treatment at the Guthrie Eye Clinic of Robert Packer Hospital in nearby Sayre, Pennsylvania. Bleiler went that very day to the clinic. Surgery was performed on his eye the next day at the Pennsylvania hospital, where he remained until October 20, 1980, but sight in his right eye was lost.

The present action against Bodnar, Doe and Tioga Hospital was commenced by Bleiler and his wife on April 11, 1983, two days after expiration of the 2 1/2-year Statute of Limitations for medical malpractice actions (see, CPLR 214-a). Consequently, Bleiler's causes of action can survive this motion to dismiss only if they are for negligence, not medical malpractice. ¹

According to the complaint, the emergency room physician, Bodnar, "was negligent in failing to take a proper medical history * * * and in his examination, care and treatment of Mr. Bleiler." Doe, the emergency room nurse, similarly "was negligent in taking or recording the history of Mr. Bleiler" which was relied upon by Bodnar. Bleiler seeks to hold the hospital liable (a) vicariously for the conduct of Bodnar and Doe, (b) for failure to provide Bleiler with "competent and qualified nurses and emergency room physicians", (c) for failure to promulgate rules, regulations and procedures regarding the taking of histories from patients and requiring that emergency room patients complaining of eye injuries be seen by eye specialists, and (d) for "being otherwise negligent," the hospital as an entity having undertaken "to attend to and care for Mr. Bleiler."

Special Term dismissed the complaint, holding that all of Bleiler's causes of action are governed by the 2 1/2-year medical malpractice Statute of Limitations. The Appellate Division modified, affirming as time-barred the dismissal of the causes of action against Bodnar and the hospital as vicariously liable for Bodnar's conduct, but reinstating the remaining causes of action. The Appellate Division, 102 A.D.2d 226, 477 N.Y.S.2d 780, granted the hospital leave to appeal to this Court, and certified the following question: "Did this court err as a matter of law in reversing so much of Special Term's order as dismissed the direct causes of action against defendants hospital and nurse as well as the cause of action against defendant hospital for vicarious liability because of the negligence of its employee-nurse?" The causes of action against Bodnar and against the hospital as vicariously liable for Bodnar's malpractice are beyond the scope of the certified question, and thus no longer in issue.

II

Before the CPLR became effective, actions for malpractice, including medical malpractice, were governed by a two-year Statute of Limitations, along with actions to recover damages for assault, battery, false imprisonment and malicious prosecution (see, Civ Prac. Act § 50). Thereafter, actions for all professional malpractice were subject to a three-year limitations period (see, CPLR 214). In 1975, however, the Legislature responded to a crisis in the medical profession posed by the withdrawal and threatened withdrawal of insurance companies from the malpractice insurance market in this State. Believing that all residents of the State were at risk and that prompt action was essential to forestall a collapse of medical services in New York (see generally, Lombardi, Medical Malpractice Insurance: A Legislator's View, at 85-102), the Legislature enacted chapter 109 of the Laws of 1975, a comprehensive plan amending the Public Health Law, Insurance Law, Workers' Compensation Law, CPLR, Judiciary Law, Education Law and Business Corporation Law (see, L.1975, ch. 109; see also, Memorandum of State Executive Department, 1975 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y., at 1599-1602).

As the Executive Department, in its statement in support of the bill, noted: "health and welfare of the people of this State are gravely threatened by the inability of health care providers to get malpractice insurance at reasonable rates. Twenty-three major hospitals will have to close their doors on June 1, 1975, if no solution is found for the current crisis. Fifty-seven others carried by the same insurer will have to close as the anniversary dates of their policies are reached. Young doctors cannot afford to set up practice here; middle age doctors are leaving the State for this reason; and, older doctors are driven into early retirement. This serious problem--the adequate delivery of health care services--must be solved." (Memorandum of State Executive Department, 1975 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y., at 1601-1602, supra.) On signing chapter 109 into law, Governor Carey declared that the "purpose of the bill is to deal comprehensively with the critical threat to the health and welfare of the State as a result of the lack of adequate medical malpractice insurance at reasonable rates", and that a principal goal of the law was "to assure the prompt and fair disposition of medical malpractice claims" (Governor's Memorandum, 1975 McKinney's Session Laws of N.Y., at 1739).

One of the reforms effected by chapter 109--perceived to be in the interest of the citizenry generally--was the addition of CPLR 214-a, which provides: "An action for medical malpractice must be commenced within two years and six months of the act, omission or failure complained of or last treatment where there is continuous treatment for the same illness, injury or condition which gave rise to the said act, omission or failure". ² "Medical malpractice" is not defined.

On this appeal we must decide whether any of the claims before us allege medical malpractice within the meaning of chapter 109. We conclude that Bleiler's claims for negligent medical care against the hospital directly, against the nurse directly, and against the hospital as vicariously liable for the conduct of the nurse, are for medical malpractice and therefore time-barred. Bleiler's claims against the hospital for failure to provide competent emergency room personnel and for failure to promulgate proper regulations, however, are for negligence and thus timely. In the ensuing sections, we deal first with the claim against the hospital directly, next with the causes of action involving the nurse, and finally with the negligent administration claims.

III

"Medical malpractice" should not be read to exclude hospitals sued for negligent treatment rendered by their medical personnel. When the Legislature in 1975 shortened the Statute of Limitations for medical malpractice claims as a means of addressing a crisis affecting society, it necessarily included hospitals sued for negligent medical treatment by their employees.

Neither the statute itself nor the legislative history explicitly addresses the issue. Bleiler urges, in support of a restricted definition of medical malpractice, that the phrase "medical or hospital malpractice" used in chapter 109--for example, in adding section 681(2) to the Insurance Law and amending section 76(2-a)(1) of the Workers' Compensation Law (see, L.1975, ch. 109, §§ 17, 19)--indicates a legislative intent to distinguish between the two. But the Legislature also defined "medical malpractice insurance," for purposes of establishing the Medical Malpractice Insurance Association, to mean insurance against both medical and hospital malpractice (id. § 17, adding Insurance Law § 681), and it included claims against hospitals in the provision for reporting claims for medical malpractice (id. § 2, amdg Insurance Law § 335). Nor does the statutory definition of the "practice" of medicine resolve the issue. The Legislature defined the practice of medicine, for licensing, as "diagnosing, treating, operating or prescribing for any human disease, pain, injury, deformity or physical condition" (Education Law § 6521). Because under the Education Law only physicians are licensed to practice medicine, it is suggested that only a licensed physician can commit medical malpractice. The argument is not persuasive. The sound public policy of this State may be to license and regulate those wishing to practice medicine as "physicians," but this does not mean that the hospitals where they practice also cannot, if the physicians are negligent in treating patients, commit medical malpractice.

That the Legislature did not intend one Statute of Limitations to apply to actions directly against a physician and another to actions against a hospital for the same conduct is evident in the genesis and expressed purposes of chapter 109. The perceived...