Gutierrez v. Tostado

• Docket Number: H049983
• Decision Date: 01 December 2023
• Parties: FRANCISCO GUTIERREZ, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. URIEL TOSTADO et al., Defendants and Respondents
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

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FRANCISCO GUTIERREZ, Plaintiff and Appellant,
v.
URIEL TOSTADO et al., Defendants and Respondents

H049983

California Court of Appeals, Sixth District

December 1, 2023

Santa Clara County Superior Court Superior Court No.: 20CV361400, The Honorable Christopher G. Rudy Judge.

Attorneys for Plaintiff and Appellant, Francisco Gutierrez: Southwest Legal Group Anthony Robert Lopez, Jr., The Ehrlich Law Firm, Jeffrey I. Ehrlich, Clinton E. Ehrlich-Quinn.

Attorneys for Defendants and Respondents, Uriel Tostado and ProTransport-1 LLC: Manning & Kass Ellrod Ramirez Trester LLP, David Vincent Roth, Mark R. Wilson.

GREENWOOD, P.J.

Francisco Gutierrez appeals from a judgment entered after the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of respondents Uriel Tostado and ProTransport-1, LLC, on the basis that Gutierrez's personal injury claims were time-barred under the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA). Gutierrez contends that the trial court erred when it found MICRA's one-year statute of limitations for professional negligence applicable. We conclude that because Tostado was a medical provider rendering professional services at the time the alleged negligence occurred, MICRA's statute of limitations bars Gutierrez's claims. We thus affirm the judgment.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

Gutierrez was driving on Interstate 280 when he was forced to stop. Shortly after Gutierrez stopped, Tostado, who was driving an ambulance, rear-ended him. At the time of the accident, Tostado was an emergency medical technician (EMT) employed by ProTransport-1, LLC and was transporting a patient from one medical facility to another. While Tostado drove, his partner attended to the patient in the rear of the ambulance.

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Gutierrez was injured in the collision and visited a chiropractor for treatment within ten days of the incident.

Almost two years later, Gutierrez filed a complaint against Tostado and ProTransport-1, alleging various personal injury claims. The respondents filed a motion for summary judgment on the sole ground that Gutierrez's claims were time barred under MICRA's one-year statute of limitations. The trial court agreed that MICRA applied and granted the motion. The trial court concluded that because Tostado was transporting a patient at the time of the accident, he was rendering professional services. The trial court held that Gutierrez's claims against the defendants were time-barred under the statute.

Gutierrez timely appealed from the judgment.^[1]

II. Discussion

A. Standard of Review

"We review the grant of summary judgment de novo, and in doing so, we review the evidence in the light most favorable to the losing party. [Citation.]" (Lopez v. American Medical Response West (2023) 89 Cal.App.5th 336, 342 (Lopez).) In this case, the trial court granted summary judgment based on its statutory construction of MICRA. We review issues of statutory construction de novo. (Aldana v. Stillwagon (2016) 2 Cal.App.5th 1, 6 (Aldana).)

B. MICRA's Statute of Limitations Bars Gutierrez's Claims

The trial court granted summary judgment on the sole ground that Gutierrez's action was barred by the statute of limitations set forth in MICRA. Gutierrez contends that the trial court erred in dismissing his claims because MICRA does not apply to his

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personal injury claims. A personal injury action for negligence must generally be filed within two years of the date on which the injury occurred. (Code Civ. Proc., § 335.1.)^[2]However, suits against health care providers for professional negligence must be filed within one year. (§ 340.5.) Gutierrez argues that the one-year statute of limitations does not apply to his action because his claims are for general negligence not professional negligence, and the duty that Tostado violated by crashing into his car was a duty of care generally owed to the public, not a professional duty owed by a medical provider to a patient.

MICRA defines professional negligence as "a negligent act or omission to act by a health care provider in the rendering of professional services." (§ 340.5, subd. (2).) The parties do not dispute that an EMT transporting a patient in an ambulance is providing medical care to the patient for purposes of the statute. (Lopez, supra, 89 Cal.App.5th at p. 347; Canister v. Emergency Ambulance Service, Inc. (2008) 160 Cal.App.4th 388, 407 (Canister).) However, only actions "alleging injury suffered as a result of . . . the provision of medical care to patients" are covered. (Flores v. Presbyterian Intercommunity Hospital (2016) 63 Cal.4th 75, 88, italics added (Flores).)

In this appeal we must decide whether a driver in a separate vehicle, injured in a collision with an ambulance transporting a patient, was injured as a result of the provision of medical care, such that MICRA's one year statute applies. Gutierrez urges us to find that any injury here was caused by ordinary negligence. He argues that where a medical provider owes no professional duty to the plaintiff and allegedly breaches only a duty owed to the general public, a claim for personal injuries should be governed by the two-year statute of limitations applicable to ordinary negligence. Conversely, respondent suggests that the critical question is not whether defendant owed plaintiff a professional duty, but simply whether plaintiff was injured as a result of the provision of medical

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services by defendant; in other words, was plaintiff's injury a foreseeable consequence of defendant's act of providing medical care?

1. Legal Framework for MICRA

The Supreme Court in Flores examined what it means for a health care provider to render professional services under MICRA. There, a hospital patient sued the hospital for negligence after the latch on her bedrail broke, causing her to fall and injure herself. (Flores, supra, 63 Cal.4th at p. 89.) The court considered the difference between regular negligence arising out of the duty owed to the general public, the negligence in the maintenance of equipment and premises that are merely convenient for, or incidental to, the provision of medical care to a patient, and the negligence that arises from the duty owed to patients in the rendering of professional services. (Id. at pp. 88-89.) The court found that "Even those parts of a hospital dedicated primarily to patient care typically contain numerous items of furniture and equipment-tables, televisions, toilets, and so on-that are provided primarily for the comfort and convenience of patients and visitors, but generally play no part in the patient's medical diagnosis or treatment. Although a defect in such equipment may injure patients as well as visitors or staff, a hospital's general duty to keep such items in good repair generally overlaps with the 'obligations that all persons subject to California's laws have[.]' [Citation.]" (Ibid.)

Relying on its prior decision in Lee v. Hanley (2015) 61 Cal.4th 1225, 1237 (Lee)^[3], for this concept of overlapping duty, the court held that where there are overlapping

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obligations-those owed to patients, and those owed to the general public-an injury resulting from a breach of a generally applicable obligation does not fall within MICRA. "Rather, the special statute of limitations for professional negligence actions against health care providers applies only to actions alleging injury suffered as a result of negligence in rendering the professional services that hospitals and others provide by virtue of being health care professionals: that is, the provision of medical care to patients." (Flores, supra, 63 Cal.4th at p. 88.) The court concluded that the hospital's alleged negligence in the maintenance of plaintiff's bedrail did not overlap with its general duty owed to the public because it was "integrally related to [plaintiff's] medical diagnosis and treatment," and was therefore professional negligence encompassed by MICRA. (Id. at p. 89.)

Flores and Lee both considered whether the injury to the patient or client was caused by negligence in the provision of professional services or whether the injury was the result of the breach of some broader overlapping duty owed to the public. Gutierrez asks us to conclude that the contrast drawn in those cases, between a professional duty and the general duty owed to the public, means that MICRA only applies where the defendant owes a professional duty to the plaintiff. However, neither Flores nor Lee considered whether MICRA applies where the plaintiff is injured during the provision of professional services, as a result of those services, but was not the recipient of the services. In both of those cases, the plaintiff was either the client or the patient. Multiple courts have considered injuries to third parties who were not patients and have concluded that MICRA applied to their claims.

In Canister, a police officer accompanying an arrestee in the back of an ambulance was injured when the ambulance hit a curb. At the time of the accident, the ambulance was being driven by one EMT while another attended to the arrestee in the rear of the

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ambulance. The officer sued for negligence. (Canister, supra, 160 Cal.App.4th at p. 392.) After finding that an EMT was a health care provider and that transporting a patient constituted professional services within the meaning of MICRA, the Canister court held that MICRA extends to" 'any foreseeable injured party, including patients, business invitees, staff members or visitors, provided the injuries alleged arose out of professional negligence.' [Citation.]" (Id. at pp. 407-408.) The court concluded that it was foreseeable as a matter of law that a police officer accompanying an arrestee in an ambulance might be injured in the operation of the ambulance. (Id. at p. 408.)

Gutierrez argues that Canister is no longer viable authority after Flores, because Flores set forth "a completely new framework...