Wieder v. N.Y. State Dept. of Health

• Decision Date: 28 October 2010
• Citation: 910 N.Y.S.2d 204,77 A.D.3d 1207
• Parties: In the Matter of Sheldon WIEDER, Petitioner, v. NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH et al., Respondents.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

910 N.Y.S.2d 204

77 A.D.3d 1207

In the Matter of Sheldon WIEDER, Petitioner,

v.NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH et al., Respondents.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department, New York.

Oct. 28, 2010.

Sheldon Wieder, New York City, petitioner pro se.

Andrew M. Cuomo, Attorney General, New York City (Raymond J. Foley of counsel), for respondents.

Before: PETERS, J.P., SPAIN, MALONE JR., STEIN and EGAN JR., JJ.

STEIN, J.

Proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78 (initiated in this Court pursuant to Public Health Law § 230-c[5] ) to review a determination of the Administrative Review Board for Professional Medical Conduct which, among other things, suspended petitioner's license to practice medicine in New York for three years.

Petitioner, a board-certified radiologist licensed to practice medicine in New York, was charged by the Bureau of Professional Medical Conduct (hereinafter BPMC) with negligence on more than one occasion, gross negligence and incompetence on more than one occasion arising out of his treatment of six patients between July 24, 2003 and May 24, 2004. A hearing was held before a Hearing Committee of respondent State Board for Professional Medical Conduct, which sustained all six charges and imposed a penalty of suspension for three years, with the suspension stayed in its entirety and petitioner placed on probation with required retraining. Both petitioner and respondentDepartment of Health sought review from the Administrative Review Board for Professional Medical Conduct (hereinafter ARB). The ARB upheld the determination sustaining the charges and the penalty imposed. Petitioner now seeks review of the ARB's determination.

We confirm. Our review of the ARB's determination is limited to "ascertaining whether it was 'arbitrary and capricious, affected by error of law or an abuse of discretion' " ( Matter of Bottros v. DeBuono, 256 A.D.2d 1034, 1035-1036, 683 N.Y.S.2d 333 [1998], quoting Matter of Chua v. Chassin, 215 A.D.2d 953, 954, 627 N.Y.S.2d 152 [1995], lv. denied 86 N.Y.2d 708, 634 N.Y.S.2d 441, 658 N.E.2d 219 [1995] ). Here, both the Hearing Committee and the ARB had before them the testimony of several doctors-some of whom were presented as expert witnesses and others as fact witnesses-together with hospital records and other documentation. Contrary to petitioner's arguments, we do not find the testimony of anyof BPMC's physician fact witnesses to be inherently incredible. In our view, the expert testimony, combined with the testimony of the fact witnesses and the documentary evidence, provided a sufficient basis for the determination that petitioner deviated from the applicable standard of care ( see Matter of Sidoti v. State Bd. for Professional Med. Conduct, 55 A.D.3d 1162, 1164-1165, 866 N.Y.S.2d 801 [2008] ).

In particular, the testimony of BPMC's expert, Ellen Wolf, furnished ample support for the findings of negligence, gross negligence and incompetence with regard to petitioner's treatment of the applicable patients. Notably, Wolf's testimony regarding petitioner's errors and misjudgments was largely undisputed and was, in many respects, corroborated by petitioner's own expert. Even petitioner, himself, acknowledged certain omissions. Any contrary testimony of petitioner's witnesses raised issues of credibility for the Hearing Committee and, ultimately, the ARB to resolve ( see id. at 1165, 866 N.Y.S.2d 801; Matter of Lugo v. New York State Dept. of Health, 306 A.D.2d 766, 768...