Surgeon to pay legal fees after suing hospital
Case should encourage hospitals to fight back
For the first time in New York, a court has ordered a physician to reimburse the legal fees and costs of a hospital and several physicians whom he sued after they recommended suspending his medical privileges following a peer-review process protected by federal statute. Such a ruling is rare across the country, but the winning attorney says the case should encourage other hospitals to fight back when faced with an angry physician.
The matter arose from a summary suspension of the practitioner’s clinical privileges to perform certain complex vascular procedures. The physician challenged the suspension and sued the hospital and several physicians involved in the peer-review process. Courts ruled against the physician, and that issue is closed, but the New York Supreme Court recently heard the hospital’s request to have the physician pay legal fees. The court ordered the surgeon to pay a total of $215,686 to Staten Island University Hospital, members of the hospital’s medical executive committee, and other physicians involved in the peer review process, according to attorney Leonard M. Rosenberg, a partner with the law firm Garfunkel, Wild & Travis, PC in Great Neck, NY. That decision is under appeal.
Rosenberg made the motion seeking an award of legal fees on behalf of the hospital, its CEO, members of its board, and some of its physicians. The ruling was made by Supreme Court Justice Joseph J. Maltese, in Richmond County, Staten Island, NY.
Maltese based his decision on an earlier finding that the hospital and its peer reviewers had complied with the federal Health Care Quality Improvement Act, which provides review participants with immunity from liability for damages if its standards are met. In May 2001, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Second Department, upheld an earlier dismissal of the surgeon’s lawsuits against the hospital and numerous peer-review participants.
"The [act] was purposely designed to prevent the chilling effect which this type of lawsuit could have upon the participants in the peer-review process," the judge wrote. "The public is protected when there is a full and frank discussion of a physician’s abilities. The purpose of this statute is to deter groundless suits against participants in medical peer-review process."
Rosenberg says the ruling should help hospital trustees, administrators, and members of the medical staff who are required by law to conduct peer review. That review process will not be effective if the participants are intimidated by threats of retaliatory lawsuits, he says, and the court’s ruling responds to those concerns.
As word spreads about this case, Rosenberg says it is possible that more hospitals and peer-review committees will be encouraged to defend themselves and pursue litigation expenses. Rosenberg notes that the Health Care Quality Improvement Act specifically allows for awarding attorneys’ fees if the court finds that the suit was brought unreasonably, frivolously, or in bad faith.
"The message is that appropriate efforts to improve the quality of care in health care institutions have been acknowledged by Congress in passing the Health Care Quality Improvement Act," he says. "When the suit is without foundation, then individuals who have been embroiled in time-consuming, expensive, aggravating litigation that otherwise would have a chilling effect on the peer-review process can recover their expenses. The message being sent by the court in awarding these damages is that they understand that meaningful peer review can’t go forward unless the immunities and protections provided by law are enforced by the courts."
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