Opinion ID: 3010261
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Dr. Altschuler

Text: The district judge's ruling on Dr. Altschuler's qualifications suffers from the same flaw.2 Dr. Altschuler is board-certified in and practices internal and pulmonary medicine. Dr. Altschuler described his primary practice area as follows: [P]ulmonary medicine involves the diseases of the chest and lungs. It involves medical treatment, certain 2 Defendants do not address the court's ruling on Dr. Altschuler's testimony, other than to argue that Holbrook was allowed to ask questions regarding the literature on radiation and mesothelioma, that Dr. Altschuler is not very knowledgeable in the field, and that he makes a habit of testifying on behalf of plaintiffs. 12 procedures such as looking into the lungs of patients. It involves an expertise in reading chest x-rays and understanding pulmonary function tests which are breathing tests. It involves treatment of occupational diseases that affect the chest. Mesothelioma is a pulmonary disease. Dr. Altschuler testified that he was familiar with John Holbrook's occupational work history, medical history and records, and was also familiar with the literature on causal agents of mesothelioma, but was not aware that radiation had ever been linked to mesothelioma. At his deposition, he could not recall a firm linkage between mesothelioma and radiation. At trial, he stated that he had found a few articles relating to sporadic rare cases out of the thousands of cases of mesothelioma each year, there are a few over the last 15 or 20 years that have shown some relationship to radiation. Read as a whole, Dr. Altschuler's testimony at trial suggests that his previous inability to recall specific literature linking radiation to mesothelioma resulted from his conclusion, based on his familiarity with the literature, that sporadic rare cases in the literature did not support radiation as a major causative factor. The district court, however, did not disallow testimony based on Dr. Altschuler's familiarity, or alleged lack thereof, with the literature on radiation and mesothelioma. When asked about radiation as a cause of mesothelioma, the court sustained a defense objection, ruling that Dr. Altschuler was not qualified as a 'radiation expert' vis-a-vis cancer. He's not an oncologist, and would not allow him to discuss the relationship between radiation and mesothelioma. The court 13 erroneously required that the expert have a specialization in cancer and radiation, despite his expertise in lung diseases, including mesothelioma. In placing restrictions on Dr. Altschuler's testimony because he did not possess the exact background it deemed appropriate, the court erred.