The Maryland Court of Special appeals on Tuesday reversed a Baltimore City trial judge’s entry of summary judgment against several medical malpractice plaintiffs after determining the appropriate remedy for a defective certificate of qualified expert is dismissal and not summary judgment. In Powell v. Breslin (No. 181, Sept. Term 2009), the appellate court ruled that the intent of the legislature was to require dismissal without prejudice in such circumstances, even though the specific statutory provision setting forth the criteria for a valid expert certificate did not expressly provide the remedy of dismissal for certificate deficiencies.
The case involved wrongful death and survival claims brought against a vascular surgeon, an anesthesiologist, the physicians’ groups, and Good Samaritan Hospital. The lawsuit alleged the anesthesiologist was negligent in either improperly administering an epidural anesthetic or that the anesthesiologist and vascular surgeon were negligent in failing to take action to avoid the progression of a spinal hematoma which ultimately lead to the patient’s death. The Statement of Claims was amended twice, the second of which added as a defendant the vascular surgeon who performed the surgery for which the epidural anesthesia was administered. At that time, plaintiffs’ counsel refiled a Certificate of Qualified Expert signed by an anesthesiologist attesting that the vascular surgeon deviated from standards of care and proximately caused the decedent’s injury and death.
The anesthesiology expert was deposed and testified that he wasn’t familiar with the standards of care applicable to vascular surgeons, and that he was not familiar with what training or experience vascular surgeons would have to allow them to diagnose and treat epidural hematomas. The vascular surgeon and his group filed a motion for summary judgment, which the trial court granted, finding that because the motion was based on facts not contained in the record, the court believed it was required to treat it as a motion for summary judgment in accordance with Maryland Rule 2-501. The remaining defendants ultimately settled their cases with the plaintiffs before trial, but an appeal was taken on the grant of summary judgment in favor of the surgeon and his group because the entry of judgment as opposed to dismissal precluded the plaintiffs from refiling their case and correcting the certificate deficiencies.
The court considered various sections of the Maryland Malpractice Claims Act, which sets forth the statutory scheme for health claims arbitration. It concluded that when reading the various sections in harmony, dismissal was clearly the appropriate remedy. It also reviewed the most recent appellate decisions involving allegedly defective certificates and found unanimity in those opinions that dismissal was the appropriate sanction for inadequate expert certification. In the end, the appeals court ruled that despite the Maryland Rule that states that the motion must be treated as one for summary judgment,the Act superceded the rule under the circumstances.
The plaintiffs had also challenged the constitutionality of the Act, claiming it was void for vagueness. The court avoided that issue by stating that since the case resolved on nonconstitutional grounds, the constitutional issue would not be addressed.