Opinion ID: 2458990
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: were the jury instructions with respect to humana's liability proper?

Text: The trial court instructed the jury that Humana had a duty to exercise that degree of care ordinarily used by hospitals under circumstances like or similar to those shown in this case. Also, the trial court said, the hospital had the following additional duties: a. Maintain procedures appropriate and adequate to determine whether the nurses and the staff of the hospital were maintaining adequate medical records which would enable the patient to receive effective continuing care as would enable a physician or other practitioner to assume the care of the patient at any time. b. To provide nurses knowledgeable of the requirements for adequately providing patient care necessary under circumstances like or similar to those in this case. c. Maintain procedures appropriate and adequate to determine whether the physicians on the staff of the hospital were carrying out their duties in a manner consistent with good medical practices. d. To maintain procedures appropriate and adequate to determine whether the nurses on the staff were properly monitoring the fluid input and output of the patient under circumstances like or similar to those in this case. e. To maintain procedures appropriate and adequate to determine whether the nurses on the staff of the hospital were following the rules pertaining to the dispensing of drugs and properly using the Physicians Desk Reference and other manuals available to them. f. To maintain procedures appropriate and adequate to determine whether the nurses were carrying out their duties in a manner consistent with good medical and hospital care under similar circumstances. The general rule for the content of jury instructions on negligence is that they should be couched in terms of duty. They should not contain an abundance of detail, but should provide only the bare bones of the question for jury determination. This skeleton may then be fleshed out by counsel on closing argument. Cox v. Cooper, Ky., 510 S.W.2d 530, 535 (1974). We believe that the above instruction fails to meet this bare bones test. First, it gives undue prominence to facts and issues. Palmore, Kentucky Instructions to Juries, Vol. 2, Section 13.11e; Fields v. Rutledge, Ky., 284 S.W.2d 659, 662 (1955). Whether the hospital hired knowledgeable nurses, or had proper supervision for staff physicians, or accurate record keeping, and so forth, were all evidently questions for the jury to consider. While they constituted criteria that the jury might use to decide the question of ordinary care, listing them in this manner was not necessary to pose the issue of the hospital's duty. In addition, the instructions should not make a rigid list of ways in which a defendant must act in order to meet his duty. In Croushorn Equipment Co. v. Moore, Ky., 441 S.W.2d 111, 115 (1969), an automobile accident case, the jury was instructed that it was the duty of the driver of the defendant, Croushorn Equipment Company, . . . not to stop the truck, leave it standing or cause it to stop or be left standing upon the main traveled portion of the highway. Regarding this instruction this court stated that: In spelling out the duty of Brassfield by enumerating suggested means of its performance, the court unduly called to the jury's attention various methods in which Brassfield might have acted. One vice of listing the means in the instruction was the apparent suggestion of the many things that Brassfield could have done, thereby inferring that his failure to do any of them was all the more palpable. Id. In the instant case, the listing of various means by which the plaintiff contended the hospital failed to exercise the proper standard of care begged the jury to find some minor or technical error. It could have given them the false impression that unless all these procedures were complied with exactly, the hospital breached its duty. The effect of the instruction was to demand more of the hospital than the law requires. Croushorn Equipment Co., supra . We conclude that the jury instruction given in the circuit court was improper and prejudicial. A more satisfactory instruction on the issue of the hospital's duty of ordinary care is as follows: It was the duty of the defendant Humana and its employes to exercise toward Mrs. Rogers that degree of care and skill ordinarily expected of reasonable and prudent hospitals under similar circumstances. If you are satisfied from the evidence that they failed to comply with that duty and that such failure on their part was a substantial factor in causing the death of Mrs. Rogers, you will find for the plaintiff against Humana; otherwise you will find for Humana. The decision of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the cause is remanded to the trial court with directions that the judgment against the respondent Kasdan in accordance with the verdict be reinstated and that Humana be granted a new trial limited solely to the issue of negligence. All concur, except STERNBERG, J., who did not sit. McCoy v. McCoy|80-SC-454-D (79-CA-1867-MR)|Cumberland|Revd. & rem.|11/ 3/80 Stumbo v. Commonwealth|80-SC-422-MR|Floyd|Affd.|12/16/80