Michaelis v. Schori

• Decision Date: 18 November 1993
• Docket Number: No. B073693,B073693
• Citation: 20 Cal.App.4th 133,24 Cal.Rptr.2d 380
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: Kate MICHAELIS, et al., Plaintiffs and Respondents, v. Janet SCHORI, et al., Defendants and Appellants.

Page 380

24 Cal.Rptr.2d 380

20 Cal.App.4th 133

Kate MICHAELIS, et al., Plaintiffs and Respondents, v. Janet SCHORI, et al., Defendants and Appellants.

No. B073693.

Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 1, California.

Nov. 18, 1993.

Review Denied Feb. 3, 1994.

Schmid & Norek, Susan H. Schmid, and K. Elizabeth Cronin, for defendants and appellants.

David Hoffman, for plaintiffs and respondents.

ORTEGA, Acting Presiding Justice.

We reverse the trial court's order denying defendant physicians' motion to compel arbitration in a medical malpractice case.

BACKGROUND

According to plaintiff Kate Michaelis' brief on appeal, she consulted defendant Dr. Janet Schori for medical care related to her pregnancy. She was under the impression Schori would be solely responsible for her care. During her first visit, Michaelis, 17 years old at the time and living with her parents, signed a binding arbitration agreement, also signed by Schori. The pregnancy appeared to progress routinely. When Michaelis went into labor she checked into the hospital after talking to Schori, who told her defendant Dr. Kim Bader would meet her there.

Bader never showed up. According to Michaelis, the hospital staff failed to detect signs of pregnancy-induced hypertension and the baby, otherwise normal, was stillborn. Disaffirming the arbitration agreement, Michaelis and plaintiff Bodie Stroud, the baby's father, sued the hospital, staff, and the two defendant doctors for medical malpractice.

Schori and Bader appeal the trial court's denial of their motion to compel arbitration per the agreement.

ISSUES

(I) Is a minor entitled to disaffirm such an arbitration agreement? (II) Are plaintiff Stroud and defendant Bader, who didn't sign the agreement, bound by it?

DISCUSSION

I

"A basic rule of statutory construction is that two potentially conflicting statutes must be construed whenever possible in such a manner that harmonizes and gives effect to both. [Citations.]" (Patricia C. v. Mark D. (1993) 12 Cal.App.4th 1211, 1218, 16 Cal.Rptr.2d 71.)

The rule has traditionally been that the "law shields minors from their lack of judgment and experience and under certain conditions vests in them the right to disaffirm their contracts. Although in many instances such disaffirmance may be a hardship upon those who deal with an infant, the right to avoid his contracts is conferred by law upon a minor 'for his protection against his own improvidence and the designs of others.' It is the policy of the law to protect a minor against himself and his indiscretions and immaturity as well as against the machinations of other people and to discourage adults from contracting with an infant. Any loss occasioned by the disaffirmance of a minor's contract might have been avoided by declining to enter into the contract. [Citations.]" (Niemann v. Deverich (1950) 98 Cal.App.2d 787, 793, 221 P.2d 178.)

But the Legislature decided to make exceptions and enacted several Civil Code ¹ provisions dealing with medical care, hospital care, and drug or alcohol abuse treatment. One of those exceptions is contained in section 34.5 which provides, "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, an unemancipated minor may give consent to the furnishing of hospital, medical and surgical care related to the prevention or treatment of pregnancy, and that consent shall not be subject to disaffirmance because of minority. The consent of the parent or parents of such minor shall not be necessary in order to authorize the hospital, medical and surgical care." ² (Italics added.)

"[ ] A minor cannot disaffirm an obligation, otherwise valid, entered into by him under the express authority or direction of a statute." (§ 37.)

"In enacting section 34.5 as a limitation upon a minor's power to disaffirm contracts, the Legislature apparently determined that the public interest in encouraging pregnant minors to seek and doctors to provide medical care related to pregnancy outweighed the public policy designed to protect minors from their own improvidence. Although no definitive history is available to explain the legislative purpose, it seems evident the Legislature recognized that an unmarried pregnant minor understandably might be reluctant to seek parental consent for medical care related to her pregnancy and that the parents of such a minor might refuse consent for reasons unrelated to the health of the minor." (Ballard v. Anderson (1971) 4 Cal.3d 873, 880, 95 Cal.Rptr. 1, 484 P.2d 1345, fn. omitted.)

"In the Civil Code, the Legislature has provided for the medical emancipation of minors ... by providing them the right to obtain reproductive health care ... without parental consent...." (Planned Parenthood Affiliates v. Van de Kamp (1986) 181 Cal.App.3d 245, 269, 226 Cal.Rptr. 361.)

The question is whether, notwithstanding the above, Code of Civil Procedure section 1295 (hereafter section 1295) allows disaffirmance if a minor's parent or guardian has not signed the medical contract. Section 1295 deals with "[a]ny contract for medical services which contains a provision for arbitration of any dispute as to professional negligence of a health care provider" and provides in subdivision (d) that "[w]here the contract is one for medical services to a minor, it shall not be subject to disaffirmance if signed by the minor's parent or legal guardian." ³

By allowing an unmarried minor to consent to pregnancy medical treatment, the Legislature empowered her to enter into such a contract. Consent to medical treatment today necessarily includes the fundamental questions of remuneration to the provider and the resolution of disputes over the quality of care. The Legislature could not conceivably have attempted with section 34.5 to "encourag[e] pregnant minors to seek and doctors to provide medical care related to pregnancy" (Ballard v. Anderson, supra, 4 Cal.3d at p. 880, 95 Cal.Rptr. 1, 484 P.2d 1345, italics added) without authorizing the minor to commit herself to these two concepts which are near and dear to medical providers.

Plaintiffs argue that section 1295 is a specific statute dealing with arbitration and thus prevails over the general Civil Code provisions which do not deal with arbitration but only with various forms of medical care in general. We disagree because arbitration, especially since the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act of 1975, is an integral part of medical contracts. Section 1295 "was enacted in an extraordinary session of the Legislature called by the Governor to alleviate the escalating cost of medical malpractice insurance premiums (and resulting problems of health care availability) due to the surge of medical malpractice actions and high jury awards. [Citations.]" (Rosenfield v. Superior Court (1983) 143 Cal.App.3d 198, 203, 191 Cal.Rptr. 611.)

The result of the statutory scheme is that section 1295 must be deemed the general statute subject to exceptions carved out in the Civil Code sections dealing with specific types of health care. In any event, Code of Civil Procedure section 1295, subdivision (d) and Civil Code section 34.5 are not necessarily in conflict. Under section 1295, if a parent signs the contract, the minor cannot disaffirm it, no matter the nature of the medical care involved, including pregnancy care. The unstated corollary is that, in general, if the parent does not sign the contract, section 1295, subdivision (d) makes it subject to disaffirmance by the minor. But, by stating only one side of the proposition (parent or guardian signs, minor is bound), section 1295, subdivision (d) by its own terms left open the possibility of exceptions if the parent or guardian does not sign. Thus, if the minor alone has consented to, and thus contracted for, the particular types of medical care set forth in sections 34.5 through 34.10, such "consent shall not be subject to disaffirmance because of minority." (§ 34.5.) By parity of reasoning, if consent may not be disaffirmed, the contract, including an arbitration provision, may not be disaffirmed.

The Civil Code sections deal with the type of treatment a minor might be reluctant to seek were parental approval needed: pregnancy care (§ 34.5), infectious, contagious, or communicable diseases (§ 34.7), treatment for rape (§ 34.8) or sexual assault (§ 34.9), and drug or alcohol treatment (§ 34.10). A minor seeking treatment for a broken leg or leukemia is ordinarily not going to be reluctant to bring a parent into the picture. But, as stated by defendants, "[i]f minors seeking pregnancy-related care are prevented from entering into binding arbitration agreements, it is conceivable that physicians and medical groups will refuse to render medical services unless a parent or guardian signs. This in turn would seriously hamper a minor's ability to freely choose from whom she wishes to receive prenatal care. A minor faced with having to obtain the signature of a parent or legal guardian for an arbitration agreement may for[ ]go prenatal care from a physician or medical group she trusts because her parent or legal guardian would be involved. Such a restriction on the rights of minors to obtain prenatal health care treatment could not be what the Legislature envisioned or intended by enacting [section] 1295 [subdivision] (d)." ⁴

We hold that section 34.5 precludes an unemancipated minor from disaffirming a section 1295 arbitration provision entered into as part of a contract for hospital, medical, or surgical care related to the prevention or treatment of pregnancy.

II

The next question is whether the arbitration agreement, although not signed by defendant Bader or plaintiff Stroud, nevertheless covers them. ⁵ We find that...