Regester v. Longwood Ambulance Co., Inc.

• Citation: 751 A.2d 694
• Court: Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania
• Decision Date: 05 April 2000
• Parties: Alice K. REGESTER, in her own right and as Administratrix of the Estate of George E. Regester, III and Gary W. Regester and George E. Regester, IV and Stephen H. Regester and Patricia J. Regester and Marykay Piergalline and Dolores R. Chandler, Appellants, v. LONGWOOD AMBULANCE COMPANY, INC. and Southern Chester County Medical Center.

751 A.2d 694

Alice K. REGESTER, in her own right and as Administratrix of the Estate of George E. Regester, III and Gary W. Regester and George E. Regester, IV and Stephen H. Regester and Patricia J. Regester and Marykay Piergalline and Dolores R. Chandler, Appellants, v. LONGWOOD AMBULANCE COMPANY, INC. and Southern Chester County Medical Center.

Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued October 7, 1999.

Decided April 5, 2000.

Reargument and Rehearing Denied June 8, 2000.

Thomas D. Schneider, Media, for appellants.

Barbara S. Magen, Philadelphia, for appellee, Southern Chester County Medical Center.

Before DOYLE, President Judge, FLAHERTY, J., and McCLOSKEY, Senior Judge.

OPINION

FLAHERTY, Judge.

Alice K Regester, in her own right and as Administratrix of the Estate of George E. Regester, III, et al. (collectively Regester), appeal from an order of the Court of Common Pleas of Chester County (trial court) which granted summary judgement in favor of Longwood Fire Company (Longwood) Inc., and Southern Chester County Medical Center (Medical Center).¹ We affirm in part and reverse in part.

Longwood is a Pennsylvania corporation which is the volunteer fire company for Kennet Township. Longwood also provides ambulance service and responds to the Chester County Emergency Services 911 System. Longwood's geographical area of responsibility includes the address of George Regester. The Medical Center is a Pennsylvania corporation. The Medical Center is a hospital and provides, among other services, mobile critical care medical services, which includes Paramedic Unit 94-3 which responds to Chester County Emergency Service 911 transmissions.

George Regester suffered a heart attack on September 8, 1996 at 7:07 p.m. His family called Chester County 911 and began administering cardiopulmonary resuscitation and restored George Regester's pulse. The 911 dispatcher called Longwood and the Medical Center at 7:15 p.m. In response, both Longwood and the Medical Center dispatched their paramedics. Although the County 911 Dispatcher repeated directions to the Regester home twice, neither the paramedics from Longwood nor from the Medical Center followed the directions to the Regester home given to them. Instead, they inexplicably traveled to the southern end of the county and as such did not reach the Regester home until approximately 7:30 p.m. Normal travel time for the paramedics to reach the Regester home from their bases would have been 3-4 minutes. Although George Regester survived the cardiac arrest, at 7:27 p.m., he vomited and choked to death on his vomit.

Regester filed a complaint against, among others, Longwood and the Medical Center alleging that had the paramedics followed the directions given to them by the 911 dispatcher, George Regester's airway would have been secured by intubation and his ability to survive would not have been compromised. Regester also noted that on December 4, 1995, only 9 months prior to September 8, 1996, the date of the fatal heart attack, George had suffered a prior heart attack and the Medical Center's paramedics had responded to the Regester home.

Longwood filed a motion for summary judgment asserting that it was immune from suit based on its status as a local agency and the immunity provided to local agencies under the popularly called Political Subdivision Torts Claim Act, 42 Pa.C.S. §§ 8541-8542. The trial court granted this motion after reconsideration by order dated September 18, 1998. The Medical Center moved for summary judgment based upon the defense of the Emergency Medical Services Act, Act of July 3, 1985, P.L. 164, 35 P.S. §§ 6921-6938 (EMSA). The Medical Center alleged that it was immune pursuant to Section 11 of EMSA, 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2), absent an allegation of gross or willful negligence. See Medical Center's Motion for Summary Judgment, Reproduced Record at 153a. Section 11 of EMSA, 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2) provides that

No emergency medical technician or EMT-paramedic or health professional who in good faith attempts to render or facilitate emergency medical care authorized by this act shall be liable for damages as a result of any acts or omissions, unless guilty of gross or willful negligence. This provision shall apply to students enrolled in approved courses of instruction and supervised pursuant to rules and regulations.

In response to the Medical Center's summary judgment motion, Regester sought leave to amend the complaint to include allegations of gross or willful negligence. On January 21, 1999, in its order granting the Medical Center's motion for summary judgment, the trial court denied Regester's motion to amend the complaint to include allegations of gross or willful negligence.

From the trial court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Longwood and the Medical Center, Regester appeals to this court. Appellate review over the grant or denial of summary judgment is limited to determining whether the trial court committed an error of law or abused its discretion. A. Pickett Construction, Inc. v. Luzerne County Convention Center Authority, 738 A.2d 20 (Pa.Cmwlth. 1999).

The first issue raised by Regester is whether the trial court erred when it concluded that the Medical Center was entitled to immunity under Section 11 of EMSA, 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2), where the Medical Center is not a licensed entity pursuant to that provision.

Essentially, Regester argues that 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2) by its plain language covers only those individuals enumerated therein, namely, emergency medical technicians, EMT-paramedics and health professionals. Because the Medical Center is not one of these, EMSA does not protect it from liability according to Regester.

The trial court found that the immunity provided by EMSA for the enumerated individuals applies to the employer of the enumerated individuals as well as to the specifically enumerated individuals. In doing so, the trial court relied upon D'Amico v. VFW Post 191 Volunteer Ambulance Association, 8 Pa. D. & C. 4th 113, 1990 WL 310635 (C.P.1990), aff'd, 413 Pa.Super. 660, 596 A.2d 256 (1991)(without published opinion). In D'Amico, the estate of a deceased individual sued a volunteer ambulance service. The ambulance service argued that it fell within the protections of EMSA. The estate argued that EMSA contained no limitation of liability in favor of an ambulance service. The trial court in D'Amico held the ambulance service to be within the protections of EMSA.

The Medical Center argues that the legislative intent in enacting EMSA was to establish and maintain an effective and efficient emergency medical services system and that the object of court construction of statutes is to effectuate the legislative intent. The Medical Center urges that it would further this legislative intent if this Court construed EMS to include the Medical Center within its coverage. Specifically, the Medical Center argues that

it appears self evident that the Emergency Medical Services Act provides immunity from civil liability to emergency medical personnel due, in large part, to the nature of the work as well as to this Commonwealth's ongoing interest in establishing, and maintaining, an effective and efficient emergency medical services system. Hence, as in D'Amico, to provide immunity to employees, but not to hospitals, medical centers and other healthcare entities, would be nonsensical. Therefore, as in D'Amico, SCCMC [the Medical Center] is entitled to the protections afforded emergency healthcare providers under the Act. Only by protecting those entities which employ emergency services workers can the purposes of the Act be effectuated.

Medical Center's brief at pp. 20-21.

Given the Medical Center's Motion for Summary Judgment below, we are confronted with the question of whether 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2) covers the Medical Center. In order to determine this, our first inquiry is whether the language of 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2) provides such protection. See Hoy v. Angelone, 554 Pa. 134, 140, 720 A.2d 745, 748 (1998)

("As with all statutory construction, our analysis begins with the language of the statute.") The operative terms of § 6931(j)(2) are all defined by EMSA. An "Emergency medical technician" is defined as "[a]n individual who is trained to provide emergency medical services and is certified as such by the department [i.e., the Department of Health of the Commonwealth] in accordance with the current national standard curriculum for basic emergency medical technicians...." 35 P.S. § 6923. An "Emergency medical technician-paramedic" referred to as an "EMT-paramedic" is defined as "[a]n emergency medical technician specifically trained to provide advanced life support services who is certified as such by the department in accordance with the current national standard curriculum for emergency medical technician-paramedics...." Section 3 of EMSA, Act of July 3, 1985, P.L. 164, as amended, 35 P.S. § 6923 "Health professional" is defined as a "licensed physician or professional registered nurse who has education and continuing education in advanced life support and prehospital care." None of these definitions includes a hospital. Moreover we note that the legislature was not unmindful of hospitals in enacting EMSA. The legislature specifically provided for a definition of hospital as being "[a]n institution having an organized medical staff which is primarily engaged in providing to inpatients, by or under the supervision of physicians, diagnostic and therapeutic services or rehabilitation services...." Our review of the plain language leads to the conclusion that the Medical Center as a "hospital" is not included within the language of 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2). The Medical Center does not argue otherwise, but instead urges this court to consider the legislative intent in enacting EMSA so as to engage in the task of statutory construction leading to the conclusion that 35 P.S. § 6931(j)(2) includes hospitals within it protections....