Rudnick v. Superior Court

• Decision Date: 05 July 1974
• Citation: 114 Cal.Rptr. 603,11 Cal.3d 924,523 P.2d 643
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 523 P.2d 643 Jacqueline RUDNICK, Petitioner, v. The SUPERIOR COURT OF KERN COUNTY, Respondent; ATLAS CHEMICAL INDUSTRIES, INC., et al., Real Parties in Interest. L.A. 30254. In Bank

Page 603

114 Cal.Rptr. 603

11 Cal.3d 924, 523 P.2d 643

Jacqueline RUDNICK, Petitioner, v. The SUPERIOR COURT OF KERN COUNTY, Respondent ATLAS CHEMICAL INDUSTRIES, INC., et al., Real Parties in Interest.

L.A. 30254.

Supreme Court of California,

In Bank.

July 5, 1974.

Wagy, Bunker, Hislop & Lewis, Bruce F. Bunker and Le Roy W. Wirz, Bakersfield, for petitioner.

No appearance for respondent.

King, Eyherabide, Anspach, Newell & Friedman, Robert E. King and Stephen Eyherabide, Bakersfield, for real parties in interest.

SULLIVAN, Justice.

Petitioner Jacqueline Rudnick seeks a writ of mandate to compel respondent superior court to vacate an order made during the course of discovery proceedings insofar as such order denied her motion for the production of certain adverse drug reaction reports and to enter an order for the production of said reports in full.

Petitioner (hereafter plaintiff) commenced against real parties in interest Atlas Chemical Industries, Inc. and The Stuart Company (hereafter defendants) the underlying action for damages for personal injuries. The complaint in essence alleges that defendants manufactured, produced and marketed a product commonly known as Dialose Plus, designed for use in the control of constipation; that such product was defective and unsafe for its intended use in that it contained a substance known as oxyphenisatin acetate which when ingested by human beings can result in jaundice, chronic viral hepatitis, and cirrhosis of the liver; that plaintiff, upon the recommendation and advice of her physician purchased quantities of Dialose Plus from defendants and used the same in accordance with the directions supplied by defendants; and that as a proximate result of using such product plaintiff sustained serious and permanent injuries.

Plaintiff noticed a deposition of the custodian of records of defendants and in conjunction therewith notified defendants to produce all records pertaining to any complaints or reports of adverse effects on persons ingesting Dialose Plus at such times as that product contained oxyphenisatin acetate. At the deposition defendants refused to produce their records containing adverse reaction reports on the ground that such reports constituted confidential communications by various physicians and that their production would be violative of the physician-patient privilege. ¹ Defendants asserted that they had already supplied all the information necessary for the lawsuit from the reports in their supplemental answers to interrogatories, which abstracted the following information from the 50 relevant reports: the age and sex of the patient, the nature of the adverse reaction (e.g., jaundice) and the month and year of the report.

Plaintiff then moved pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 2031 to compel production of the reports on the grounds that they were relevant and not privileged and that there was good cause for their production. Respondent court granted the motion only as to the names and addresses of the doctors and in all other respects denied it. ² Plaintiff then filed the instant petition for a writ of mandate in the Court of Appeal which summarily denied it. We granted a hearing and issued an alternative writ of mandate.

The writ of mandate is a proper remedy for reviewing discovery procedures. (Carlson v. Superior Court (1961) 56 Cal.2d 431, 435--436, 15 Cal.Rptr. 132, 364 P.2d 308; Flora Crane Service, Inc. v. Superior Court (1965) 234 Cal.App.2d 767, 775--776, 45 Cal.Rptr. 79.) We were impelled to issue the alternative writ in this case because we are presented with a question of first impression which is of general importance to the trial courts and to the profession, and in conjunction with which general guidelines can be laid down for future cases. (Associated Brewers Distr. Co. v. Superior Court (1967) 65 Cal.2d 583, 585, 55 Cal.Rptr. 772, 422 P.2d 332; Oceanside Union School Dist. v. Superior Court (1962) 58 Cal.2d 180, 185, fn. 4, 23 Cal.Rptr. 375, 373 P.2d 439; see Roberts v. Superior Court (1973) 9 Cal.3d 330, 335--336, 107 Cal.Rptr. 309, 508 P.2d 309; Pacific Tel. & Tel. Co. v. Superior Court (1970) 2 Cal.3d 161, 170, fn. 11, 84 Cal.Rptr. 718, 465 P.2d 854.) The novel question confronting us is whether a third party recipient of confidential information from a physician may assert the physician-patient privilege.

Plaintiff urges that in the instant case the question must be answered in the negative and the adverse drug reaction report must be held discoverable. Defendants urge that the answer must be in the affirmative and the reports held privileged from disclosure under the physician-patient privilege. ³

We start with the basic principle that there can be no discovery of matter which is privileged. (Greyhound Corp. v. Superior Court (1961) 56 Cal.2d 355, 395, 15 Cal.Rptr. 90, 364 P.2d 266; Code Civ.Proc. §§ 2016, subd. (b), 2031). ⁴ Evidence Code section 994 ⁵ limits the right to claim the physician-patient privilege to: (1) the holder of the privilege; (2) a person authorized to claim the privilege by the holder of the privilege or (3) the physician who received the confidential communication. Defendants being neither the patient (the 'holder of the privilege' pursuant to section 993) ⁶ nor the physician, can claim the privilege only on the basis that they are persons authorized to do so by the patient. There is nothing in the record before us to indicate, nor do defendants urge, that they were expressly authorized to claim the privilege by the various patients mentioned in the 50 reports. Thus, the question narrows to whether defendants were impliedly so authorized as a matter of law by the respective patients.

It is apparently agreed by both plaintiff and defendants, ⁷ that the contents of the adverse drug reaction reports are 'confidential communications between patient and physician' as defined in section 992 ⁸ since this information was originally communicated in confidence by the patient to the physician during, and arose out of, a physician-patient relationship as defined in sections 990 and 991. It would appear that the existence of a 'confidential communication between patient and physician' as defined by section 992 (see fn. 8, Ante) is determined at the time the information is communicated to or ascertained by the physician. If the information is communicated in confidence in the course of a physician-patient relationship 'by a means which, so far as the patient is aware, discloses the information to no third persons,' except those reasonably necessary to further the transmission of the information or to further the accomplishment of the purpose for which the physician is consulted, then that communication becomes a confidential communication at that moment. Such a communication therefore remains a confidential communication subject to privilege unless the privilege is waived by the patient as provided in section 912. Accordingly, it appears that the contents of the adverse drug reaction reports constituted a confidential communication when originally communicated to the physician and thus fell within the protection of the physician-patient privilege. As a result we are concerned solely with the effect of the disclosure of this privileged material by the respective physicians to defendants.

The 'disclosure in confidence (by the physician) of a communication that is protected by (the) (physician-patient privilege) . . . when such disclosure is reasonably necessary for the accomplishment of the purpose for which the . . . physician . . . was consulted, is not a waiver of the privilege.' (§ 912, subd. (d).) Thus, for example, if the physician reported to defendants the adverse effects of the drug on his patient so as to obtain assistance in the use of the drug in treating the patient, such disclosure even if consented to by the patient would not constitute a waiver of the privilege. The official comment to subdivision (d) of section 912 by the Senate Committee on Judiciary, reproduced in full in the margin, ⁹ makes it clear that '(c)ommunications such as these, when made in confidence, should not operate to destroy the privilege even when they are made with the consent of the client or patient. . . . (T)he privilege holder has not evidenced any abandonment of secrecy. Hence, he should be entitled to maintain the confidential nature of his communications to his . . . physician despite the necessary further disclosure.' The comment then goes on to note that this may change California law as embodied in Green v. Superior Court (1963) 220 Cal.App.2d 121, 33 Cal.Rptr. 604.

In Green, a party to the action sought to compel by subpoena duces tecum the production at trial of, and testimony concerning, the prescription records of pharmacists. The latter refused to testify claiming under former section 1881, subdivision 4 of the Code of Civil Procedure, that the information sought as to drugs dispensed by a pharmacist on prescription by a physician was as much a part of the physician-patient privilege as the testimony of the physician himself. It was urged that the privilege should be so extended as to be claimed by the pharmacist since in some instances knowledge of the drug dispensed would reveal information which had been confidentially communicated by the patient to the doctor. The court held that the pharmacist could not assert the privilege because the statute did not expressly include pharmacists as persons entitled to claim the privilege.

Former Code of Civil Procedure section 1881, subdivision (4), was superseded upon enactment of the Evidence Code (in effect Jan. 1, 1967) by sections 990--1007 dealing with the physician-patient privilege. It is noteworthy that the comment of the Senate Committee on Judiciary to section 912, subdivision (d) specifically states that 'the patient's presentation of a physician's prescription to a registered pharmacist would not constitute a waiver of the...