Accountability

[Birdbomb]

M.D. can be sued after patient hits boy in car crash

The mother of a boy who was struck and killed by a car could sue the driver's doctor for failing to warn the driver of the risk of operating a motor vehicle while taking medication he had been prescribed, the Supreme Judicial Court has ruled.

A Superior Court judge had granted summary judgment for the defendant physician, finding that he owed no duty of care to anyone other than his own patient.

But the SJC reversed.

"I conclude that a physician owes a duty of reasonable care to everyone foreseeably put at risk by his failure to warn of the side effects of his treatment of a patient," wrote Justice Roderick L. Ireland in the lead opinion, which justices Judith A. Cowin and Francis X. Spina joined

In a concurring opinion, Justice John M. Greaney agreed with the result in the case but criticized the broad nature of Ireland's plurality opinion.

"I cannot agree … with the proposition that liability in such a case is justified by principles of ordinary negligence," wrote Greaney. "This concept is incorrect and leads Justice Ireland … to the sweeping conclusion that physicians owe a legal duty of care to virtually everyone who may come in contact with one of his or her patients."

[Bernard]

I think the ultimate responsibility is with the patient and 3rd parties should sue the patient. The patient should be able to sue the doctor if he was negligent.

How many people with epilepsy are driving when they know that, legally, they are not supposed to? Should there doctors be liable if they have an accident? I don't think so.