NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

_____________ No. 19

- 3434

_____________ GLADYS MENDOZA, Personal Representative of Elias Mendoza
,

Appellant

v.
INSPIRA MEDICAL CENTER VINELAND; SOUTH JERSEY HEALTH CARE; INSPIRA HEALTH NETWORK, INC.; ANDREW ZINN, MD; THE HEART HOUSE; NAEEM M. AMIN, M.D.; KIDNEY AND HYPERTENSION SPECIALISTS, P.A.

__________________ On A p peal from the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey (D.C. No. 1

- 1 6

- cv

- 01337 ) District Judge: The Honorable Noel L. Hillman

____________________ Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)

May 27 , 2020

Before: AMBRO
, HARDIMAN, and RESTREPO
, Circuit Judges

( O pinion Filed: June 2, 2020 )

_____________________ OPINION *

_____________________

HARDIMAN
, C ircuit Judge.

* This disposition is not an opinion of the full court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not constitute binding precedent.2

In 2014, Elias Mendoza was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit at Inspira Medical

Center Vineland (Vineland) with shortness of breath. Mendoza had fluid overload in his
lungs, so t he internal medicine group that handled his care at Vineland ordered , among
other things, a cardiology consultation that was performed by Dr. Andrew Zinn

. Id . Four
days after his admission to the hospital
, Mendoza suffered a respiratory and cardiac

arrest , leading to a permanent anoxic brain injury. L ess than a year later , Mendoza died
from acute respiratory failure as a result of cardiac arrest and coronary artery disease

. As relevant to this appeal, Mendoza’s wife Gladys
, in her capacity as personal
representati ve of his estate, sued Inspira Health Network (I nspira ), Dr. Zinn, and The

Heart House, alleging medical negligence

. She based this claim on a note in her

husband’s discharge summary s tating he had difficulty receiving dialysis while at

Vineland because of the ICU’s staffing limitations. After discovery, Plaintiff failed to

adduce evidence sufficient to show Inspira had any responsibility to staff the dialysis

unit, or that Dr. Zinn or The Heart House breached their standard of care. So the District

Court granted those three Defendants summary judgment

. See Mendoza v. Inspira

Medical Center Vineland , 2019 WL 5304129, at * 11 (D.N.J. Oct. 17, 2019)

. This appeal

followed

. 1

Our careful review of the record and the various opinions leads us to conclude that
we could scarcely improve on the work of the learned trial judge. As a procedural matter,

1 The District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and exercise de novo review. See Weitzner v. Sanofi Pasteur Inc.
, 909 F.3d 604, 609 (3d Cir. 2018).3

the District Court addressed the issues methodically and gave Plaintiff opportunit ies to
amend her complaint and hone her arguments. And substantively, we perceive no factual
or legal error in the Court’s conclusions that: (1) an affidavit of merit was required
against Inspira ; (2) Plaintiff failed to adduce evidence that Inspira had an y responsibilities
relating to the staffing of the dialysis unit ; and (3) Plaintiff failed to marshal evidence

sufficient to demonstrate that Dr. Zinn or The Heart House violated their standard of care

. Accordingly, we will affirm for substantially the same reasons explained by the District

Court

.