explaining difference between “corporate liability” asserted against institution itself and respondeat superior liability based on negligent actions of institution’s employees
How later courts described this case
- explaining difference between “corporate liability” asserted against institution itself and respondeat superior liability based on negligent actions of institution’s employees
- “Because the duty to uphold the proper standard of care runs directly from the hospital to the patient, an injured party need not rely on the negligence of a third-party, such as a doctor or nurse, to establish a cause of action in corporate negligence.”
- state-owned medical facility has sovereign immunity from claims of corporate negligence
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
NIGRO, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority holds that 42 Pa.C.S. § 8522(b)(2) does not provide a waiver of sovereign immunity for Commonwealth hospital facilities. As a result of the majority’s reasoning, public hospitals are allowed to operate at a lower standard of medical care than private hospitals. Although a narrow reading of the sovereign immunity exception might lend to the Majority’s conclusion, I do not believe the legislature intended the disparate result of divergent standards of care. Because I read 42 Pa.C.S. § 8522(b)(2) in concert with the corporate liability doctrine and 1 Pa.C.S. § 1922, I do not believe the legislature intended this result, I must respectfully dissent 1 .
*563 In Thompson v. Nason Hospital, 527 Pa. 330 , 591 A.2d 703 (1991), this Court adopted the corporate liability doctrine, formally charging hospitals in our Commonwealth with a direct nondelegable duty to
use reasonable care in the maintenance of safe and adequate facilities and equipment [citations omitted] ... select and retain only competent physicians [citations omitted] ... oversee all persons who practice medicine within its walls as to patient care [citations omitted] ... and ... formulate, adopt and enforce adequate rules and policies to ensure quality care for patients [citations omitted].
527 Pa. 330, 339 , 591 A.2d 703, 707 (1991). Thompson recognized that “[t]he corporate hospital today has assumed the role of a comprehensive health center with the responsibility for arranging and coordinating the total health care of its patients.” Id. at 338 , 591 A.2d at 706 .
In this action, Karyl Moser was taken by ambulance to the Emergency Room of Ashland State General Hospital to receive medical treatment by medical professionals under the control of Ashland State General Hospital. Even though two private hospitals, Pottsville Hospital and Good Samaritan Hospital, are in the immediate proximity of the Appellants’ home where Karyl Moser was injured, Moser was not presented with a choice as to which facility she wished to be taken to for treatment. Subsequent to her admission and treatment, Appellees billed Mrs. Moser and her husband in excess of $5,535.00 for services provided. Had she been taken to either Pottsville Hospital or Good Samaritan Hospital, Karyl Moser, in all probability, would have received a similar bill. It is clear under Thompson that either of those facilities would owe her a duty of care. It is illogical that the mere misfortune of being transported to a public rather than a private hospital should result in a patient receiving potentially inferior medical care without a direct remedy.
*564 This Court adopted the doctrine of corporate liability to hold hospitals accountable for the administering and dispensing of medical care. In light of Thompson we must now move forward in defining the sovereign immunity provisions to hold all hospitals in Pennsylvania to the same standard. In enacting 1 Pa.C.S. § 1922, the General Assembly confers to this Court the ability to prevent absurd and unreasonable results. To hold otherwise allows public hospitals to operate at a lower standard of care than private hospitals.
. 1 Pa.C.S. § 1922 provides in pertinent part:
*563 In ascertaining the intention of the General Assembly in the enactment of a statute the following presumptions, among others may be used:
(1) That the General Assembly does not intend a result that is absurd, impossible of execution or unreasonable.