Gold v. Greenwich Hospital Assn.

• Decision Date: 31 December 2002
• Docket Number: (SC 16748).
• Citation: 262 Conn. 248,811 A.2d 1266
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: LYNN GOLD v. GREENWICH HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION ET AL.

262 Conn. 248

811 A.2d 1266

LYNN GOLD v. GREENWICH HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION ET AL.

(SC 16748).

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Argued October 31, 2002.

Officially released December 31, 2002.

Borden, Norcott, Katz, Vertefeuille and Zarella, Js. Lynn Gold, pro se, the appellant (plaintiff).

Richard A. O' Connor, with whom, on the brief, was Louis J. Dagostine, for the appellees (defendants).

Opinion

VERTEFEUILLE, J.

The pro se plaintiff, Lynn Gold, appeals from the judgment of the trial court rendered after granting the motion for summary judgment filed by the defendants, Greenwich Hospital Association and William Hunt. On appeal, the plaintiff claims that the trial court incorrectly characterized her claim as one sounding in medical malpractice, so that expert testimony was required to establish the applicable standard of care pursuant to General Statutes § 52-184c (a).¹ We affirm the judgment of the trial court.²

The following undisputed facts and procedural history guide the resolution of this appeal. On an evening in January, 1994, the plaintiff went out to dinner with Raye Cooke,³ a woman for whom the plaintiff had assumed a care-taking role. During the course of their dinner, Cooke had a violent allergic reaction. As a result, the plaintiff took Cooke to the emergency room of Greenwich Hospital (hospital), where Cooke was given two injections to alleviate her allergic reaction. Hunt, an emergency room physician, treated Cooke during her stay in the emergency room.

Once Cooke's allergic reaction had subsided, Hunt assured the plaintiff that Cooke likely would sleep through the night. Hunt then discharged Cooke and the plaintiff drove Cooke back to Cooke's home. The plaintiff agreed to spend the night in order to take care of Cooke. Cooke was docile and tired when she arrived home, but awoke three times after going to bed.

When Cooke awoke for the third time, she asked the plaintiff about some notes that the plaintiff had been taking. The plaintiff did not disclose the nature of the notes. Cooke then assaulted, kicked and chased the plaintiff who fled from Cooke's home. During the course of her escape, the plaintiff slipped on ice in Cooke's driveway and exacerbated injuries that she had suffered during the attack. The plaintiff sustained injuries to her jaw, head and right side of her body as well as psychological trauma as a result of the alleged assault and subsequent fall.

The plaintiff subsequently initiated this action against the defendants alleging that "the hospital and [Hunt] knew or should have known that [Cooke] was a danger to others." Maintaining that the plaintiff's claim was one of medical malpractice, the defendants asserted that the plaintiff's failure to disclose the identity of an expert witness who would testify to the applicable standard of care would be fatal to the plaintiff's case pursuant to the requirements of § 52-184c (a).

Accordingly, in August, 1998, the plaintiff disclosed that Richard Lavely, a physician whom the plaintiff listed as being certified in emergency medicine, would testify as her expert regarding the standard of care. Shortly thereafter, citing the inordinate amount of time that it had taken to disclose any experts and the trial court's order that such disclosure be made by September, 1998, the defendants moved the trial court to preclude the plaintiff from disclosing any additional expert witnesses past the September deadline. The defendants' motion was granted.

The defendants then deposed Lavely and ascertained that Lavely did not have sufficient information available to him to provide an opinion based on reasonable medical probability. Lavely indicated that in order to determine the applicable standard of care, he would require access to Cooke's medical files and Hunt's deposition statement, as well as sections of the hospital's emergency room regulations. None of these was available.⁴

The defendants subsequently moved to preclude the plaintiff's use of Lavely as an expert witness because Lavely would be unable to testify concerning the applicable standard of care to the requisite level of medical probability. The defendants' motion to preclude Lavely's testimony was granted.

The defendants then moved for summary judgment on the grounds that the plaintiff could not produce expert testimony against the defendants on the issue of the applicable standard of care, the alleged breach of that standard of care, and causation of the plaintiff's injury. The defendants argued that because the plaintiff effectively was precluded from offering any further expert testimony as a result of prior court orders, they were entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The trial court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment and rendered judgment thereon in their favor. The plaintiff appealed from the judgment to the Appellate Court and we transferred the case to this court pursuant to General Statutes § 51-199 (c) and Practice Book § 65-1.

On appeal, the plaintiff claims that the trial court improperly rendered summary judgment because her claim is one of ordinary negligence, and not one of medical malpractice. The plaintiff asserts that the provision of § 52-184c requiring a plaintiff to establish a breach of the prevailing standard of care does not apply to her claim and hence no expert testimony is required. We disagree and conclude that the trial court properly determined that the plaintiff's claim sounds in medical malpractice and that expert testimony is required to establish the prevailing standard of care. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.

We begin by setting forth the applicable standard of review. "The standard of review of a trial court's decision granting summary judgment is well established. Practice Book § 17-49 provides that summary judgment shall be rendered forthwith if the pleadings, affidavits and any other proof submitted show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. In deciding a motion for summary judgment, the trial court must view the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party.... The party moving for summary judgment has the burden of showing the absence of any genuine issue of material fact and that the party is, therefore, entitled to judgment as a matter of law.... Our review of the trial court's decision to grant the defendant's motion for summary judgment is plenary." (Citations omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) LaFlamme v. Dallessio, 261 Conn. 247, 250, 802 A.2d 63 (2002). On appeal, "we must determine whether the legal conclusions reached by the trial court are legally and logically correct and whether they find support in the facts set out in the memorandum of decision of the trial court." Zachs v. Groppo, 207 Conn. 683, 689, 542 A.2d 1145 (1988).

The plaintiff in the present case does not dispute that there are no contested material facts for the purposes of the defendants' motion for summary judgment. Rather, she maintains that the trial court improperly applied medical malpractice law to her claim against the defendants. We therefore must determine whether the trial court properly characterized the plaintiff's complaint as sounding in medical malpractice.

"The classification of a negligence claim as either medical malpractice or ordinary negligence requires a court to review closely the circumstances under which the alleged negligence occurred. [P]rofessional negligence or malpractice . . . [is] defined as the failure of one rendering professional services to exercise that degree of skill and learning commonly applied under all the circumstances in the community by the average prudent reputable member of the profession with the result of injury, loss, or damage to the recipient of those services." (Emphasis in original; internal quotation marks omitted.) Trimel v. Lawrence & Memorial Hospital Rehabilitation Center, 61 Conn. App. 353, 357-58, 764 A.2d 203, appeal dismissed, 258 Conn. 711, 784 A.2d 889 (2001); Santopietro v. New Haven, 239 Conn. 207, 226, 682 A.2d 106 (1996). "Furthermore, malpractice presupposes some improper conduct in the treatment or operative skill [or] . . . the failure to exercise requisite medical skill . . . . From those definitions, we conclude that the relevant considerations in determining whether a claim sounds in medical malpractice are whether (1) the defendants are sued in their capacities as medical professionals, (2) the alleged negligence is of a specialized medical nature that arises out of the medical professional-patient relationship, and (3) the alleged negligence is substantially related to medical diagnosis or treatment and involved the exercise of medical judgment." (Citation omitted; emphasis in original; internal quotation marks omitted.) Trimel v. Lawrence & Memorial Hospital Rehabilitation Center, supra, 358. "[T]o prevail in a medical malpractice action, the plaintiff must prove (1) the requisite standard of care for treatment, (2) a deviation from that standard of care, and...