Page v. Wilson Memorial Hospital, Inc.
| Decision Date | 18 November 1980 |
| Docket Number | No. 807SC336,807SC336 |
| Citation | 272 S.E.2d 8,49 N.C.App. 533 |
| Court | North Carolina Court of Appeals |
| Parties | Ruth D. PAGE, Administratrix of the Estate of Lucy Page Hogg v. WILSON MEMORIAL HOSPITAL, INC., and Carolyn Coates and Jacqueline Simms Ward. |
Biggs, Meadows, Batts, Etheridge & Winberry by Auley M. Crouch, III, Rocky Mount, for plaintiff-appellant.
Smith, Anderson, Blount, Dorsett, Mitchell & Jernigan by Samuel G. Thompson and Jodee Sparkman King, Raleigh, for defendants-appellees.
Plaintiff contends that it was error for the trial court to exclude testimony of the expert witness, Nurse Pennington, regarding the standard of care in situations involving a patient's use of a bedpan, and in directing a verdict for defendants.
Nurse Pennington would have testified that placing the patient on a bedpan in a chair and leaving her unattended for periods of three to four minutes was a violation of the standard of nursing care in Wilson County Hospital or hospitals located in similar communities. Her testimony would have constituted sufficient evidence of actionable negligence to take the case to the jury.
Defendants argue that the court correctly sustained objection to Nurse Pennington testifying as an expert witness concerning the standard of practice in the field of nursing in Wilson County or a similar community. They contend that plaintiff failed to establish Nurse Pennington's familiarity with the standard of nursing care in hospitals and communities "similar" to Wilson County Hospital, as required by G.S. 90-21.12. The essence of defendants' position is that the plaintiff did not present any evidence that the communities with which Nurse Pennington was familiar were similar to the community wherein the treatment occurred.
Article 1B, Chapter 90 of our General Statutes entitled Medical Malpractice Actions, controls the standard of care for "health care providers" including the practice of nursing. The Supreme Court of North Carolina, in Wiggins v. Piver, 276 N.C. 134, 171 S.E.2d 393 (1970), abandoned the strict "locality" rule in favor of the "similar community" rule. That rule was affirmed in Dickens v. Everhart, 284 N.C. 95, 199 S.E.2d 440 (1973), and is now codified in G.S. 90-21.12.
We find that the testimony of Nurse Pennington was admissible. By adopting the "similar community" rule in G.S. 90-21.12 it was the intent of the General Assembly to avoid the adoption of a national or regional standard of care for health providers and not to exclude testimony such as that offered in this case where it was shown that the witness was familiar with the standards of hospitals in adjoining and nearby communities.
The record shows that Nurse Pennington was a registered nurse licensed to practice in North Carolina, Kansas and Missouri, formerly an assistant professor at East Carolina School of Nursing where she supervised student nurses in caring for patients at Nash County Hospital in Rocky Mount, Martin County Hospital in Williamston, Pitt County Hospital in Greenville, Beaufort County Hospital in Washington and a nursing home in Greenville; that she was familiar with the practices, procedures and standards of nursing care in those hospitals where she supervised student nurses; that her lecture responsibilities covered the nurses' role in meeting the physical and psychological needs of the patient through various nursing procedures; that she received her B.S. in nursing from the University of Kansas and had more than 14 years experience as a nurse and nursing instructor in North Carolina, Kansas and Missouri. Based on the record before us, we find that it was error to exclude Nurse Pennington's testimony and consequently to direct a verdict in favor of defendants.
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Wright v. U.S.
...Id.; Shumaker, 714 F.Supp. at 158-59 (applying the medical malpractice statute to a physician); Page v. Wilson Mem'l Hosp., 49 N.C.App. 533, 535-36, 272 S.E.2d 8, 10-11 (1980) (nurse); Moore, 139 F.Supp.2d at 713 (hospital). To prevail on a medical malpractice claim in North Carolina, a pla......
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